Fast and Furious Arcade Edition review: chaotic, spectacular, totally ludicrous

Let's get this out of the way early doors, we love the Fast and Furious Arcade game. We've already written at length on the subject. It's an unashamedly old school arcade game, chaotic, spectacular and totally ludicrous in the exact same way the recent Fast and Furious movies have been.

Now having done its stint hoovering up pound coins in your local bowling alley, it's available for PlayStation, Xbox and Nintendo Switch. It features the same selection of six tracks, all of which are packed with more explosions than an arson attack at a fireworks factory and all of which see you completing a different mission, from destroying a military drone by crashing your car into it to defusing a bomb by crashing your car into it.

There is a slight tweak to the game in deference of home players. Because the tracks are all over in about a minute, they've been extended by duplicating the opening section. This means you complete the equivalent of two 'laps' before dashing through a final section to the finish line. It also means you have to switch off the reasoning part of your brain as you tumble down a Swiss mountainside only to then somehow tumble down the exact same Swiss mountainside, in direct contravention of Euclidian geometry.

Slightly more irksome on a practical level is the fact that, much like Cruis'n Blast from the same developer, this has no online multiplayer, just a two player split-screen mode. Don't get us wrong, split screen is a laugh, but when the original cabinet supported up to eight linked players, it feels like a significant compromise. This console version also doesn't support steering wheel controllers, so the dream of replicating the true arcade experience in the home remains just that.

Anyway, this is a far more detailed appraisal than Fast and Furious Arcade Edition needs or deserves. It's like sending a food critic to review a Big Mac. Yes, the game has the longevity of a particularly sickly mayfly, but it's a brilliant, rollercoaster ride of the sort there's far too little of these days. If that sounds like your jam, then it's well worth the £25.