The cut and thrust of bike racing is like dispatch riding without the oncoming traffic. Unlike dispatch riders, though, GP500 delivers.
Trenton Webb

As you'd expect, GP500 goes all the way: full race calendar, all the circuits, the complete roster of teams, correctly coloured leathers, accurate helmet decals, neck-cracking high-sides and abrasive slides up the road. All you need is a rub down with wire wool to get that post-crash gravel rash feeling and the experience would be complete. But that's what you pay for in a licensed bike game.

GP500 looks every bit as slick as the Repsol-sponsored original, and in the transitory world of race game good looks, GP500 is now the swan to EA Superbikes' ugly duckling, but in the escalating arms race of technical eye-candy, that's only to be expected and won't last.

What really matters is the accuracy of simulation, player control and racing fun. GP500's options offer real race and arcade physics modes - the simulation has enough things to tweak without becoming too daunting, while for the real hooligans among us there's hoots-a-plenty to be had in arcade mode, smacking into walls and lobbing bikes up the road.

What GP500 really brings to the pits, though, is tough competition. In recreating the fierce racing of the real 500 circuit's main pack, Microprose have both fulfilled their obligations and made GP500 a daunting experience for the L-plate computer biker.