I sat down to watch the remake of Death Race on DVD a few days ago...not a bad film, and not a bad leading lady either.

But I digress, it got me thinking that it's been years since a decent driving game was released where racing round a track came second to some good, old-fashioned violence.

I'm talking about the likes of Carmageddon,Twisted Metal, Destruction Derby and the lesser-known Roadkill on Amiga's ill-fated CD32!

Well, my prayers could be answered with the arrival of Split/Second early next year on the Xbox and PS3. Surprisingly, it's from Disney...but don't for a second think it's going to be all cartoony and cute. It first impressions are anything to go by, old Walt will be turning in his grave.

On the face of it, Split/Second appears much like Burnout or Flatout, except that each race is going to be punctuated with lots and lots of gorgeous-looking explosions!

Race round the track, fill your power meter and trigger enormous blasts to take out your rivals. Why not blow a bridge, destroy a building or rupture the road? All's fair in love and racing!

Developers are doing their utmost to bring realism to driving titles right now so it's refreshing to see some of the more technical aspects of racing put to one side and replaced with an element that I often think is often missing from the genre, fun.