Street Rod 2

Time to buy a leather jacket; a vat of hair gel and take that T-Bird down to the local drive-in burger joint before leaving some sucker without wheels in the nearest aqueduct because you beat him for his pinks.

If all that sounded like gibberish to you, rent out ‘Grease’ from Mr Video or, failing that, play Street Rod 2, an early example of underground racing and car customizing. It is summer vacation and you have one goal in mind: becoming king of the road.                            

Your beginnings will be humble however, you only have a limited amount of cash to start with. You must spend this wisely, purchasing a pricey car and leaving nothing left for spare parts or fuel will soon spell ‘Game Over’.

After getting a humble set of wheels, you can begin to customize it and when you've spent what you can show it off at the burger joint. In the parking lot you wait for other racers to pull up next to you. You can just stare at them vacantly/menacingly until they drive off or challenge them to a race.

There are a variety of events in the game, from drag races to aqueduct races ala the Grease finale. The only way to get anywhere is to race for ownership of your opponents wheels, which of course means you could lose yours just as easily.

The controls for the car are pretty slippery and frustrating. It's easy to lose control of your vehicle and flip it or hit an obstacle. Be prepared for some very swear-worthy moments. Couple this with random transmission drops and it just makes that elusive victory all the more sweet. Win a car, sell it and upgrade. Keep on doing this until ‘The King’ finally deems you worthy for a race. Just be sure you do it before the end of summer.

Despite the flaws in gameplay you will find yourself coming back for just one more race before bedtime. Buying parts and turning your rust bucket into a mean machine is a simple and fun affair. This title would have a much higher rating if not for some truly crippling bugs; the phantom screw of death being one of them. Be sure to save your game before changing a transmission or working on the engine. There is always the chance that a ‘screw’ will suddenly appear from out of nowhere and crash the game. Play it, you'll see what I mean.