Santa Dash

We're all brought up to believe that Father Christmas only delivers presents to the good boys and girls. As a result, there's likely to be much empty space underneath the tree at PG Towers this Christmas morn.

However, if Santa Dash is to be believed, the big fat bearded one might not have skipped our office chimney because of our various misdemeanors over the course of the last twelve months, but rather because he simply didn't have time.

Clear and present danger

Santa Dash is the tale of Mr Claus's sprint across the skies on Christmas Eve.

It's your job to guide him from rooftop to rooftop, avoiding the various hazards and obstacles to ensure each and every kid wakes up happy come the crack of dawn.

At least, that's what the game's developers would have you believe. Strip away all the decoration, however, and Santa Dash's true colours are hard to miss – this is a Canabalt clone, plain, and simple, a little cynically given a festive refresh to spur some yuletide sales.

As with Semi Secret's iPhone smash, your only input is to make Santa jump – with the '5' key – both between the rooftops and over any objects in your path.

The longer you hold the button, the higher Santa leaps, but given that you can only jump once at a time knowing when to employ a short jump and when to soar into the sky is what determines how long you last.

Christmas calamity

Survival is all that's at stake. As soon as you mistime a leap and fall to the floor, or run head-first into a falling icicle, it's Game Over.

The problem is, not only does Canabalt do such free running far better, but Santa Dash is also suffers from a rather dodgy setup.

Even when it's obvious you've cleared an object, leaping over it and landing again to carry on your merry way, the game still sometimes brings the level to a close.

Such mistakes are completely unacceptable in a game with such a simple premise and, taking into account the highly unoriginal nature of the game in the first place, this is one present we could all do without.