Demolition Inc.

Humanity is destroying Mother Earth, desecrating her soil with bustling, overcrowded cities all crammed with towering skyscrapers acting as monuments to our avarice.

But what can you do? Well, if you follow Demolition Inc.’s example you could employ an alien race to fly down in UFOs, use tractor beams to seize control of mini-vans, and then drive them - and their doomed occupants - into the bases of these grey monstrosities in the hope that they come tumbling down.

The only problem is that, while decimating cities from the ground up has an intrinsic Rampage-like virtual appeal, this PC conversion’s main campaign scrimps a little too much on the gleeful destruction.

Across six different - though aesthetically quite similar - cities Demolition Inc. promises a playground of destruction spread through 30 levels, but the reality is little less explosive.

Viewed isometrically from a moveable camera, each mission tasks you with reducing every building to rubble using a set number of special powers dropped by an ever-hovering UFO.

Ranging from simple oil slicks and patches of wheel glue that force cars off course to more elaborate items such as exploding cows, earthquakes, and a Katamari-style wrecking ball, all are placed with simple drag-and-drop controls onto the map.

The challenge comes from the surprisingly measly number of powers at your disposal in each mission. This turns the majority of levels into rather restrictive puzzle scenarios, where the object is to create chains of mini-explosions to cause maximum damage.

In principle, it’s a solid way to force you to master each power before unleashing them in the more seismic Rampage mode (where you can replay level for high scores with stacks of explosive resources), but it can be a frustrating pain in practice.

This is mostly down to the often random physics that only sporadically play out moves as you planned them, with buildings sometimes crumbling after glancing contact with a small car and yet somehow surviving a collision with an oil tanker.

Such glitches mean you can be forced to restart lengthy levels time and time again to get it right.

That’s not to say Demolition Inc. isn't fun - just watching an unplanned series of events spiral into a mega tower collapse is cruelly cathartic. But you'll inevitably wish that these moments were the norm, rather than a rare treat.