Adding to the madness was the now-familiar combination of Aftertouch and Impact time, letting you control the motion of your vehicle as it flips around in slow motion after crashing even when taken out, you still had the ability to take out others if you managed your wreck properly. Like driving on the other side of sanity (aka 'the fun way')? Get even more boost by taking out opposing cars by forcing them into walls or on-coming traffic. Like driving with skill? Get rewarded with 'boost' for careful - yet risky - drifting.

The racing game for those who love racing games or hate them, 'Burnout 3' can be enjoyed by anyone.

With that in mind, the staff of the IndyStar video games department - me - debated for several weeks on this list of the greatest racing video games ever.

With the Grand Prix of Indianapolis kicking off Saturday and the Indianapolis 500 later this month - not to mention NASCAR's Coca-Cola 400 and Formula One's Spanish and Monoco grand prix races over the next few weeks - it's like 'Christmas in May' for those fond of automobile racing. Admittedly rudimentary in nature, racing games have actually evolved less than other genres such as shooter or RPG you have to squint really hard to see the shared DNA between 'Gunfight' and 'Grand Theft Auto V,' but Atari's 'Night Driver,' for example? Unmistakably a racing game. With electro/mechanical games populating the penny arcade in the '50s and '60s, racing video games pre-date what we think of as arcade/computer games.

Download n64 car battle games