Rupert The Bear didn't really like our copy of Windows Vista. In spite of the box claims that Rupert The Bear: Nutwood Games would work happily on any version of Vista post-Windows 98, whenever we tried to play the sliding tiles game a bitmap error was delivered and Vista shut the program down. We couldn't recreate this error on XP.

That aside, Rupert The Bear: Nutwood Games is a fairly traditional collection of activities for anklebiters to tackle - this one's aimed at three year olds and over - although they do feel like they've come straight off the production line of an educational software construction kit. While clearly tailored around the title character, anybody who regularly buys educational titles will have seen much of this before, and there's no attempt whatsoever to stir things up. Instead, it's a reliable, steadfast and quite enjoyable collection.

The idea is that the program provides a middling collection of puzzles and activities, along with a collection of pictures to print off. There's the aforementioned sliding pictures game, which we couldn't test, and the game of snap, which we could. This is fun, and ideal for two players if you've got them, with you both working off keyboard controls. Alternatively the computer provides a good opponent, at three difficulty levels.

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The jigsaw is even more straightforward, inviting youngsters to piece together a simple puzzle and be rewarded with the full picture. The word search, meanwhile, comes in variably difficult flavours and is presented very well, making it easy and fun to play. Then there's spot the difference, which hit us with another bitmap error and another crash.

The big asset where Rupert is concerned, though, is that the graphics and production values are excellent. Take the game of snap, for instance: the pictures of characters from the Rupert The Bear world are of terrific resolution, and backed with the bright and attractive overall presentation of the software as a whole. It's one of the best looking titles of its ilk on the market.

Which makes the compatibility problems all the more frustrating. Granted, it's not the most expensive title on the market, but even so, it's not unreasonable to expect everything to work. What we could get our hands on to try was of solid quality and is suitably Rupert glossed, with friendly voiceovers. But it's ultimately a product with a couple of problems for anyone using Vista.

A solid educational title with some terrific production values and a bit of a Vista-aversion problem. If you're running XP, though, it's definitely worth the modest price tag.