Coming soon to a PC new you, with Lawnmower Simulator 2007 you can experience the excitement of using some of the world's most powerful lawnmowers, including the RS102H Tractor Mower and 387 Cylinder Push Mower, as you guide them through some of the most overgrown gardens from around the globe. Tackle bad routes, scare the neighbour's cat away with a hose and defiantly keep hold of footballs that those pesky kids accidentally kick into your garden. Yes indeed, with Lawnmower Simulator 2007, you can experience all the thrills and spills of cutting grass!

But wait… imagine a lawnmower simulator without the grass, or a flight simulator without the flying; it's almost like a ship simulator that manages to replicate life on the open sea, but without the open sea. And, true enough, while Ship Simulator 2006 can contest to being one of the only simulators that manages to duplicate life on board a variety of seaworthy vessels, it constricts where you are allowed to guide them.

First things first. SS2006 lets you control up to 8 ships, from small craft such a speedboats, water Taxis and Tugs to bigger vessels such as Cargo Containers, a Luxury Yacht and even the Titanic. While most simulators allow for a degree of freedom that allows budding enthusiasts to control their selected vehicle wherever and whenever they want, SS2006 restricts itself to a series of pre-designed 'missions' set in an around the harbours of Rotterdam and Hamburg, or the tropical islands of Thai Phi Phi.

While the missions do add some nice challenges to overcome, variety is not this game's strong point and with such a limited amount of locations and ships to pilot, it isn't long before things become repetitive. Those hoping to replicate voyages of the 1800s or follow in the path of explorers such as Columbus are going to find what's on offer in SS2006 very limiting.

It doesn't help either that the game isn't quite as realistic as the Microsoft simulators from which it tactlessly borrows in order to replicate a similar looking box design, something that almost reeks of the kind of underhand tactics used by a developer not fully confident that their own work will surpass that of an already established competitor. It would have been nice for the developers to bring to life the bridges of each ship with the kind of attention to detail we've come to expect from modern day simulators, yet SS2006 skimps on these details, with some of the most lifeless ship interiors imaginable. While there is some compensation added with being able to wander around the deck of a very impressively recreated Titanic, on the inside these ships are lifeless hulks.

But SS2006's biggest problem is its lack of environmental variety, which for a simulator such as one based on the sea, should have been one of the first things the developer paid greater attention to. While there are weather effects, these amount to nothing more than occasional rain storms and while a nice feature clouds the view enough for it to be slightly more challenging to sail, that's all there is. There are no storms, there's no ability to sail at night or through fog and crucially - surely the one thing that should have been added to a ship simulation - there are no waves. Guiding the Titanic around the tropical islands of Thai Phi Phi is nice, but the added inclusion of hurricane force winds and storm surges would have made the experience a lot more of a rewarding challenge.

Still, the developers do a good enough job with what's on offer and the handling for each ship is different enough to provide a fair few hours of pleasant nautical entertainment - providing you manage to stay well away from the other vessels that often clog up each waterway and prevent yourself from hitting the slight snag in the physics engine, which can see a ship like the Titanic capsize after colliding with a boat one tenth of its size.

While an acquired taste and definitely lacking the polish and attention to detail so often showered on Microsoft's own range of simulators, Ship Simulator 2006 is a fine start to what will eventually become a successful franchise, once the various problems are solved. As an introduction into the world of shipping and sailing it's not a bad effort, but as an in-depth and richly detailed simulator, it's something better left alone until Ship Simulator 2007 comes along and adds the much needed features that are sorely lacking here.

Reviewed by Kieron Giacopazzi for AceGamez (All Rights Reserved).