Every Super Sprint player, at some time or other during the game, has eyed the car in front and wished for a bonnet-mounted machine gun to deal out some swift tarmac justice.

Super Cars II fulfils that dream in spades, with the contestants armed with everything from homing missiles to smart mines. Combat - er, sorry, racing takes place on large scrolling tracks, and as with the estimable Super Sprint, it's a case of first past the flag takes home the pot (and uses it to buy even larger and more unfriendly weapons). In that junk mail competition phase, up to two players can take part, in which case the screen politely splits vertically and draws an attractive line down the middle to make things clearer.

A while ago, some American company made the bizarre move of importing little devices that fitted on the dashboard of your car and made excitingly dangerous noises when you pointed them at other motorists and pressed the trigger. Super Cars II is built along the same lines.

It's incredibly satisfying to throw your car around a sharp bend, swerve around the pack leader and rake him with missile fire, causing a large explosion and probably a devastating - but exciting to pyromanical onlookers - pile-up. Everything's geared towards this violent destruction - it's not the winning or the losing that matters, but the taking apart.

However, if you do decide to play properly, the game still delivers a hefty dollop of fun. Those rascally ST drivers play for keeps, hedging you into the crash barriers and cutting you off on the bends, while the increasingly complicated tracks add to the manic action. Long term you're likely to tire of it, but for a quick buzz on a quiet afternoon, Super Cars II is hard to beat.