Lost Classics: Carmageddon (PC, iOS, Mac)
by William Talley, filed in Games, Lost Classics on Nov.30, 2012
Carmageddon was one of the most beloved – and controversial – PC games of the mid to late 90s. The game that began life as a vanilla Destruction Derby game was inspired by the movie Death Race 2000. In fact, at one point in its development it was even planned to be a sequel to the cult classic (this after a deal to attach it to the Mad Max license fell through), and a comic book was even produced. However, when that fell through as well, developer Stainless Games decided to make it into an original game of its own, and thus, Carmageddon was born. Taking control of one of several vehicles, you make your way through several tracks. You could win the race ‘traditionally’, but what fun is that? Why race to the finish line when you can destroy every other car, or run into all the hapless pedestrians in the area? Yeah, while the racing mechanics are fairly spot-on, the real fun is driving over pedestrians and seeing them explode into masses of blood and guts. This game was ported to N64 and PS1, but those versions were so awful that console players never got a chance to see what the fuss was about. However, the PC original was recently re-released on GOG.com, and an IOS version was also released with an Android version coming early next year. The original developers are also working on a kickstarter-funded sequel. If you missed this classic, now is a good time to check it out.