DeathSprint 66 combines one of my favourite mods with one of my favourite movies

DeathSprint 66 wears its biggest aesthetic influence on both sleeves: Stephen King's The Running Man and, in particular, the big-budget '80s movie starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. The book is one of King's earliest, so early in fact he was still writing under the pseudonym Richard Bachmann, and so DeathSprint 66's neon-soaked televisual stylings all come under the umbrella of the Bachmann network: Welcome to the future, where you run through endless deathtraps for money while the crowd goes wild.

I was sold on DeathSprint 66 just on that, and then I realised it got even better. I've always loved surfing mods, which can be found in plenty of games but for me are inextricable from Counter-Strike, and this is essentially Surfing Mods: The Game. I think these began as movement challenges before spawning their own sub-genre, and they're basically maps where you have to get from point A to B as quickly and gracefully as possible. This is the core of DeathSprint 66, except there's murder lasers and flesh-rending metal everywhere and, of course, you're racing against others.

DeathSprint 66 has PvE courses, and these are great for learning the ropes, because this is an unapologetically fast and difficult game. After your first half hour you'll have died dozens of times, failed countless courses, and be very familiar with the idea of another clone body being launched onto the track. DeathSprint 66's course designers are sadists that have been given free rein, and all you have to do is run through their elaborate configurations of slicey lasers, hairpin turns and sudden bursts of verticality without hitting anything. You'll fail, again and again, and I wouldn't be surprised if there's a PC somewhere at Sumo Newcastle tracking all the humiliation just for yucks. 

This is a game that likes killing you, in other words, but the good news is it's just as keen about killing others. The beating heart of DeathSprint 66 is the PvP mode where up to eight players race and try to screw each other over as much as possible while doing so. Honestly this game doesn't even need weapons, such is the default carnage of eight players sprinting forwards and shoulder-barging each other off the tracks and into wall-mounted mincers, but boy does it have 'em. 

Look at that cocky little squirt running away in the lead. Fast? Not as fast as the gigantic glowing-red buzzsaw that just bisected his ass. Or the seeker charge that relentlessly hunts him down and ends things with a boom. There's a lovely weapon that sets a stationary laser trap to insta-gib Deathsprinters and, if you set it in just the right position near boost pads, it's super-hard to see. But the notifications that soon pop up are to die for.

A large part of DeathSprint 66's appeal is the precision, the clean lines and snappy controls and the pure exhilaration of a perfect lap. But what makes it work, what makes this game sing, is the total chaos when you get eight people at once trying to do that. It's a miracle if there are no fatalities by the first bend and, when you really get in a tight group and no one can quite escape the pack, the pack turns in on itself and a bloodbath ensues. There are elegant multiplayer races to be found in here, sure there are, but most land somewhere between Fall Guys and Mortal Kombat. 

There are times in DeathSprint 66 where you'll impress yourself. A tight corner opens out onto a grind, and you take the line onto a wall, hurdle up in seconds and pirouette off before slamming into a laser trap, land in the perfect orientation, and instantly surge forward. There are other times when you stumble around like a hyperspeed drunk and get gibbed constantly by the things you didn't even see coming. Somewhere in the middle of those extremes is where the magic of DeathSprint 66 lives: That sense of power, precision, control of one's self then, just as inevitably, the explosion into bloody chunks. Womp womp. Ready to go again?