Of course, great graphics mean nothing if the game runs like treacle online. When released, Unreal was slow and realistically unplayable over the Internet, but after a myriad of patches the online experience has been perfected. This knowledge hasn't been wasted and the optimised code from the original has been used and improved for Unreal Tournament, and the resulting game runs smoothly from the word go.

Rushing along the top and through the carriages of a speeding train while some evil individual tries to either shove a rocket down your throat or pick your head off with a squeeze of a sniper rifle trigger certainly adds a new dimension to a team game. A number of parameters can be changed on each game so you could, for example, have a deathmatch where a single shot kills, or lower gravity to allow further variety. Couple this with the fact that UnrealEd, a level editing package, is included, allowing you can create your own arenas, and the longevity is virtually infinite.

Although primarily a multiplayer game, Unreal Tournament also contains a single player tournament. Fighting against some cruelly skilled bots, you must ascend the tournament ladders in all of the different game types, or simply practice in a bot match. The bots themselves have some fantastic AI - not only will they jump and dodge, but they seem to understand the idea of teamwork and the point of running away and hiding when someone is teeing up a fistful of rockets. Naturally, the game only really comes into its own when you experience the satisfaction of blasting your mates into the middle of next week, but bots can be used to boost the numbers or provide an opponent for a practising team.

Unreal Tournament is a virtually flawless masterpiece. The graphics, online speed and machine-hungry specifications that afflicted the original have all been rectified. You can argue that the single player element isn't strong enough for Unreal Tournament to sell on that alone, but the facts are simple - if you like multiplayer first person shooters then you must get Unreal Tournament.