Destruction Derby is a ‘smash ’em up’ car racing game developed by Reflections and published by Psygnosis in 1995. In it you can drive three different cars and choose from four different play modes (Destruction Derby, Wreckin’ Racing, Stock Car Racing, and Time Trial).

The cars in Destruction Derby feature simulated physics to model the handling as they slowly deform. The individual race tracks are small, to encourage wrecking of opponents, and there’s a damage indicator in the bottom right-hand corner of the screen if you want to see how close to death you are.

Winning actual races in Destruction Derby, however, means avoiding crashes as much as causing them, but the game mode determines a race’s overall goal. Some races can be won by destroying a certain car or by scoring a certain number of points by wrecking as much as possible. There is also a ‘Duel’ mode on all the play modes and this allows you to go head to head with one other car, but that car is always computer-controlled.

Disappointingly, there’s no split screen multiplayer in Destruction Derby. And we didn’t even get split screen multiplayer in the 1996 sequel, Destruction Derby 2…

Overall though, Destruction Derby is not a bad racing game. It’s obviously been dumbed-down to fit more acceptably onto a console than a PC, which is why the game is better known on the PlayStation.

More: Destruction Derby on Wikipedia