The first blast wiped out your space center, and in just three hours, the high-tech weapons satellite is going to strike again--unless you stop it. You are Jean-Luc Couger, a special operative for the government's Strategic Covert Actions Team. As the terrorists count down to a second attack, you must duck, sneak, and crawl through enemy-infested environments. And when the situation calls for a more aggressive approach, you'll have a wide variety of weapons to choose from.

WinBack: Covert Operations stars French agent Jean-Luc Cougar, member of the S.C.A.T. team, which must use stealth and firepower to wrest control of a military base that's been overrun by terrorists. Based on the Nintendo 64 game of the same name, WinBack: Covert Operations will feature much more detailed graphics and animation, as well as full voice dubbing, more maps, and more selectable characters in multiplayer mode.

If you can play WinBack: Covert Operations for more than five minutes without thinking of , you're either suffering from amnesia or probably refer to all video games as Space Invaders and have only turned the PS2 on by accident thinking it was the VCR. It's kind of a cross between the stealthy shoot-'em-up bits in Metal Gear Solid--except without the variety and complex story line--and a more arcade-style game such as , except without the nonstop action. Oh, and the main bad guy is called Kenneth, and the elite commando team to which you belong is known as S.C.A.T.
Although WinBack: Covert Operations is less than the sum of its parts, it's still fun. Hiding behind crates and jumping out to shoot unsuspecting bad guys is undoubtedly entertaining, even if the slightly fiddly controls sometimes get in the way. Unfortunately, there's not much more to the game than that, so it does get rather repetitive--although the various multiplayer modes do make up for this to some degree. If you can't wait for Metal Gear Solid 2, this is a reasonable, but not outstanding, stopgap. --David Jenkins -- Amazon.co.uk Review