The first-person section features well-modelled enemies and an innovative weapons system

No hidden agendas here. EA present their latest skew on the overused formula of fast cars and big guns in a wasted world of the future.
Matt Pierce

Ever since Mel Gibson crammed himself into unforgivingly tight leather trews and went a bit nuts, the 'meeja' in all its forms has been awash with visions of post apocalyptic wastelands dominated by cars. An inherently flawed concept, bearing in mind the resistance of tyres to nuclear explosions, but that's not bothered Accolade.

Like the age-old Quarantine, and the still-notorious Carmageddon, Redline is a volatile mixture of skilled driving married with random, foot-based violence. Essentially then, it's Quake meets Carmageddon. But with car-mounted guns. The kind of combination that has the BBFC wailing and gnashing their teeth about the potentially inflammatory subject matter, and that does the sales figures no harm at all.

Unfortunately, (and despite the subject matter) Redline is very little to get excited about. As neither a dedicated driving game or a first-person shooter, it suffers from a lack of focus and ends up succeeding in neither camp.

As Interstate 82's perpetual tardiness is proving, it's no mean feat to create the perfect shooter/racer hybrid, and whereas with this, Accolade have managed to create an reasonably enjoyable, high-octane blaster, the overwhelming feeling is of superficiality; it's throwaway stuff. The cars (of which any of 10 can be used) all handle too similarly - that is to say they all feel like faster, sloppier versions of the on-foot section.

The environments, meanwhile, veer between garish, over-lit futuristic arenas and sprawling, low-detail courses littered with pointless ramps and debris. But if the vehicular aspect of the game is a poor-man's Carmageddon (and it is), the more traditional first-person sequences are Quake-like. More often than not the levels demand a gratuitous frenzy of automobile combat, (mowing down enemies across your bonnet, natch), before taking to foot and getting involved in the tortuous corridors and passages of the levels' interiors.