Carmageddon
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Carmageddon (1999 on Game Boy Color)
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Carmageddon (1999 on PlayStation)
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Carmageddon (2005 on J2ME)
Description official descriptions
Carmageddon is a violent car racing game where the racing element can be equally important as wrecking opponents' cars or gathering kills by ramming into pedestrians. At the beginning the player has only one car and is ranked at #99. The overall objective is to race all the way to the top, collecting the opponents' cars on the way as trophies (and possibly replacements to one's vehicle). In the race itself the player tries to damage opponents by driving into them, and can also kill pedestrians.
Damage, kills and spectacular moves earn credits for upgrades and even making repairs to the car at anytime during the race. If a specific opponent's car is wrecked multiple times in successive races, it is added to the choice of available vehicles. There are many power-ups strewn around the courses that range from useful (more speed, instant brake) to fun and downright absurd. Though the player can win a race by finishing first, wrecking everything in sight is encouraged. The game offers open environments where exploration away from the racing course is encouraged.
Spellings
- חולה הגה - Hebrew spelling
Groups +
- 3D Engine: BRender
- BPjS / BPjM indexed games
- Carmageddon series
- Gameplay feature: Recordable replays
- Games made into comics
- Genre: Car / motorcycle combat
- Genre: Racing - Open world driving
- Green Pepper releases
- Protagonist: Female (option)
- Replay (GT / Infogrames / Atari) releases
- Setting: 2020s
- Theme: Future sports / Brutal sports
- Theme: Zombies
Screenshots
Promos
Credits (DOS version)
106 People (101 developers, 5 thanks) · View all
Arcade Director | |
Producer | |
Line Producers | |
Manual Design and Layout | |
Marketing Manager | |
PR Manager | |
Director of QA | |
Assistant Director of QA | |
IS Technician | |
Lead Tester | |
Temp Warden | |
Testers | |
[ full credits ] |
Reviews
Critics
Average score: 81% (based on 34 ratings)
Players
Average score: 3.9 out of 5 (based on 160 ratings with 11 reviews)
The Good
**The Bad**
**The Bottom Line**
In 1975, a film called "Death Race 2000," starring the late but great David Carradine (Best known for the legendary "Kung Fu" television series and the more recent "Kill Bill" films) was released into theatres. The concept was basic: A cross country race as a form of entertaining and pacifying rowdy and restless civilians; the twist being that this race isn't about coming in first place, the winner is chosen by how many innocent civilians and other racers are killed in the process. The film wasn't well received, many critics and parents were offended by the films tasteless content. It was excessively gory, almost every female character in the film whipped out their breasts or went stark naked at least once, and the films sense of humour was extremely morbid and bleak, treating vehicular manslaughter and sexism as comedic relief. The film did gather a cult following (Including my wife & I) and whether you like it or not, it is arguably the prototypical "Blood Sport Opiate" film, appearing over a decade before "The Running Man," which is the film most people think of when dealing with a premise involving a blood sport as pacifying entertainment. You're probably asking yourself, "What the hell does this have to do with Carmageddon?" Well, it has a lot to do with it. Carmageddon is clearly inspired by the film, in fact during its development process, it was going to be titled "Death Race 2020" and presented as a tie in with the comic book of the same name, intended as a sequel to the film. However, they could not keep the rights to the franchise and the name was dropped but in truth it can still be called a Death Race video game. Save for a complete lack of breasts (Sorry, nudie fans), the game mimics the film exactly, from its tasteless sense of humour to its ridiculous amounts of gore and disregard for the laws of physics. Unfortunately, this lack of tact might turn a lot of people off which is a shame because if you look past this element, its one of the most entertaining games ever made and it would easily make my top 10 games of all time and there's almost no competition when it comes to being my favourite racing game, the closest being
DOS · by Kaddy B. (777) · 2010
The Good
I loved the fact that you can run over innocent civilians. Simple but great idea. And you can run em over and get all kinds of special bonuses, like the splatter bones and the bonus for artistic impression etc etc. I really laughed my *ss off when i first played this game, I never had so much fun.
I loved the music. Normally I don't like rock/metal music that much, but this really adds up to the "stress killer" level of the game.
I really loved the variety of vehicles in this game. From basic sedan's with the grill removed to beetle's with spikes on top of them, bulldozers, bigfoots.... you name it, it's in the game.
I also love all the characters that drove the vehicle's. Their mugshots at the beginning of the race is all you'll ever see of them in the game, but it's always fun to know who you are racing against.
The characters can also challenge you to change positions at the start. You can accept it or "chicken out" on them.
The cops are really annoying in this game, but when you waste a cop in this game, you'll have an overwhelming sense of satisfaction. Lovely!
The Bad
Well there are some lame things about this game. First of all, you can always splatter a pedestrian by bumping lightly into them. Doesn't matter how hard you'll hit them, they'll die anyway.
Another thing that I hated were the annoying remarks from Max Damage and Die Anna. It is fun when you first play the game, but it really gets into your head when you've played the game for about 15 minutes. Fortunately you can turn that off.
The Bottom Line
This game is fun. It is repetitive, but you won't notice it that quickly. If you had a rough day, and you want to blow off some steam, then this is the game for you.
DOS · by Goteki45 (323) · 2003
The Good
Well, it is very addictive at first (not as much as GTA though...)
The Bad
For one, the 3D engine is horrible. Really horrible. Slow even on a P2-350, and doesn't even look good enough to justify it. The controls are really, REALLY bad and even the pedestrians' screams aren't enough to satisfy the unwary buyer.
The Bottom Line
Leave it alone, and get it over with.
DOS · by Tomer Gabel (4534) · 1999
Trivia
Death Race 2000
The whole game is reminiscent of the 1975 movie Death Race 2000. The movie's premise is identical to that of Carmageddon. It featured David Carradine and a naive pre-Rocky Sly Stallone. And if you look at the main character's car, it is exactly like the main car in Carmageddon with a different paint job. Exidy's 1976 arcade game Death Race was another descendant of this movie.
German index
On 31 October 1997, the English version of Carmageddon was put on the infamous German index by the BPjS. More information about this topic can be found in the game group.
German version
The German version had robots, not people. This was due to Germany's strict legislation regarding violence in computer games. Those robots are also hidden in the standard releases. Calling CARMA.EXE with the "-ROBOTS" parameter will replace pedestrians with robots.
Indian version
The cows in Carmageddon were removed from the Indian release.
O. J. Simpson reference
One of the opponents, "OK Stimpson", is a clear reference to American football celebrity and actor O. J. Simpson in name and likeness. The game also alludes to the murder trial Simpson was involved in, by showing stains of a red liquid on his shirt in Stimpson's portrait picture, as well as having him drive a "Fraud Broko" SUV, similar to the Ford Bronco involved in a police chase in relation to the real-world case. Most likely due to the legally sensitive nature of the topic, some of the references were removed for the US release. The driver was renamed "Juicy Jones" (still a reference to Simpson's nickname, The Juice) and the stains on his shirt recolored to orange.
Sound
The engine noises came from a variety of places. One was my '67 Buick. Another was a guy who happened to come and check my hard drive. He had a rally car replica, so we strapped a minidisc to the back and he drove it around the Isle of Wight at highly illegal speeds! The pedestrian squelching noises were made by my partner Bill, the design director. He refuses to admit how. We think they're some dubious bodily function."
--Patrick Buckland, interviewed in PC Review May 97
Soundtrack
The soundtrack to Carmageddon consisted partially of music by the band Fear Factory, with the songs Body Hammer, Demanufacture, and Zero Signal. These tracks were off their album Demanufacture, but had the vocals removed for the game.
Starship Titanic
Carmageddon is listed in the "thanks" section of the Starship Titanic end credits.
UFO
In the level "Roswell that ends well" it is possible to find a UFO. Go to the top of the big pyramid, and jump into it. After your fall, you will be able to see it.
UK version
The game was only given a release in the UK after a palette change, converting the humans into 'zombies' with green blood (There were also 'zombie' cows, etc). Later, a patch was released, restoring the original palette.
Information also contributed by Emepol, emerging lurker, Floodspectre, hydra9, JayBee, Late, Ola Sverre Bauge, Ummagumma, Xoleras and Yeah No
Analytics
Related Sites +
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The Making Of… Carmageddon
article about the game's history, on EDGE (27th June 2008)
Identifiers +
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Contributors to this Entry
Game added by robotriot.
Android added by GTramp. iPad, iPhone added by Sciere. Symbian added by Kabushi. Windows added by The cranky hermit. Macintosh added by agaiz.
Additional contributors: Heikki Sairanen, Daniel Saner, tarmo888, Kabushi, formercontrib, Crawly, 1gnition, Patrick Bregger, GTramp, Plok.
Game added November 2, 1999. Last modified November 10, 2024.