I am inexpressibly amazed that Carmageddon is now on the iPhone. It's a reminder for me of just how far computers have come in only the last fifteen years - a device that I carry around in my pocket now runs a full 3D game much more smoothly than my 486DX ever did. Not to mention the way that sensitivity decreases so much over time - this was a massively controversial game when it was released, with widely-publicized outcry (including from Greg Pope MP, which the makers absolutely leapt on by immediately giving out a press release titled "Pope speaks out against Carmageddon") - and now it can be released without anybody batting an eyelid.

This is part of the Carmageddon Reincarnation project, which also includes a new game to be released through Steam next year. This port of the original is being billed as "Carmageddon Funsize", but that name would seem to imply it's been cut down - I've been extraordinarily impressed at just how full-featured the game is on a device slightly smaller than the disc the original came on.

The entire game really is in here, spruced up a little in places like the interface to make it a bit bolder - and it runs at three times the resolution of the original. I was unsure how well the controls would work on a touchscreen at first, but I found myself getting used to them quickly - it sort of helps that even on the PC the controls were nigh-on undriveable (and I mean this in the nicest possible way... everything always felt very heavy), so you never feel like you're losing any precision.

The premise is still exactly the same - a cycle of "here's a race, now do what you like and don't follow the course if something else takes your fancy" - and you're free to run around smashing into things or running over the rather Mortal Kombat-styled pedestrians. Interestingly, there are now little highlighted tokens on the race list so that you have the incentive to complete the levels in all three ways - by actually doing the race (if you're dull), by destroying all opponents (if you're aggressive), or running over all the pedestrians (if you're mad).

I appreciated all sorts of little touches like that - the "stealing" concept of unlocking cars is now explained in the game to the point where it almost actually makes sense, and water handling is far less annoying than it used to be. Other little differences I noticed is that I think the game's gravity has been increased a little so that it's a bit less lunar, and that OK Stimpson has conspicuously been renamed to Juicy Jones. Throughout the experience, it's just really nice to be able to feel just by playing it that the developers of this port really cared about what they were doing, and finding a Solid Granite Car powerup (which increases your mass by a factor of fifty) feels as great as it always did.

And the thing I really couldn't believe - the action replay mode has survived! At any time, you can swipe the screen to the left and then rewind, step through and replay any particularly good moments of madness you've caused. They've also taken advantage of the invention of Youtube with a direct link to your account - you can see me demonstrating that even the rubbish powerdowns like Bouncy Bouncy sometimes get you out of trouble here, and what always happened when you fell down the mineshaft with Pinball Mode (which is rather more crude than I had originally intended as I was playing without sound and hadn't realized that the voice samples stay in the video). I was very fortunate to land on the Instant Repair after completely destroying every part of my car - and then again when a man in a hazard suit obligingly ran straight under me.