You know how in Quake you're shooting people who are made of polygons? It's still good fun, isn't it? You know those soft foam darts and balls, called Nerf balls, which people throw at each other? It's good fun, isn't it? What if you combined the two?
Andy Smith

Are you on something?
Not at all. Nerf ArenaBlast is a first-person shooter where you actually shoot Nerf darts and Nerf balls at the other players.

What?
Yup, that's it. Run around blasting each other with foam weapons.

Sounds daft.
It may sound daft, but it's certainly not. In fact, it's a great deal of fun and surprisingly addictive.

But I want to frag and gib people!
Blood 'n' guts aren't to everyone's taste, and while I suppose you could say this was a nice 'family' alternative to the gore normally associated with FPSers, that's not really the point. The competition is the thing and it's surprising how you soon forget that someone hasn't exploded when you hit them on the back of the head with a lump of foam.

So how do I score a kill?
Ah. Cleverly, the designers - Visionary Media - have gone for a points scoring system rather than deaths. Hits against an opponent wins you points and reduces their energy. When all their energy has gone they're vaporised and knocked out of the game. Energy can be replenished by picking up power-ups scattered around the arenas.

And how many of those are there?
Arenas? Eight, and they're all superbly designed and wonderfully diverse. There's an outdoor arena full of trees and rivers, an underwater arena and even one set among some towering skyscrapers. As you'd expect, there are the prerequisite launch pads, low-gravity areas and airlocks.