8% is the lowest review score N64 Magazine ever gave, and it went to Carmageddon 64. It’s a bit of a shame, as the concept could lead to a good game, but the N64 version itself has lots of its own particular issues. It’s based on Carmageddon 2, but with some significant changes to be allowed on the N64. Carmageddon is a vehicle slaughter game, where one of the aims is to run over pedestrians for points.

For the second game, the pedestrians were renamed “zombies”, but kept the same. They still looked like regular people, they released a lot of blood, and they flew for ages after you hit them, bouncing off the ground. For the N64, this all had to change. The “zombies” are now very obviously zombies, and now turn into a green mist when you hit them. It completely lacks the impact and shock value the original had, which was the defining element of the game. Dogs and traffic were also completely removed from the game.

You have three ways you can complete missions: destroy your three rival cars, kill enough zombies, or simply drive around the track and finish. The first two methods get tedious fast, and the third is ridiculously easy (as you don’t really have to worry about other racers). The handling is also atrocious and it never feels like you have control of a car, all of them feeling like an incredibly cheap RC car. This, along with the dodgy physics, are the main things that ruin what was left of the game.

It’s a shame, really, as there a lot of tracks to explore, and plenty of vehicles to unlock – you can even change the zombies to dinosaurs. However, even if everything worked well, it would get repetitive quickly. It needed different kind of missions rather than just doing the same thing over and over.

Worst

A shocking travesty. If you see Carmageddon 64 in the shops, take it off the shelves, rip up the box and throw the cart repeatedly against the wall until it breaks.

Tim Weaver, N64 Magazine #36. Review Score: 8%

Remake or remaster?

I think the concept is worth trying again.

Official ways to get the game.

There is no official way to get the N64 version of Carmageddon 64, but Carmageddon 2 is on GoG and Steam.