In the ’90s and ’00s, vehicular combat games were commonplace. Franchises like Twisted Metal, Burnout, and Carmageddon were instrumental in establishing the brand of high-octane, aggressive driving that is much rarer in 2026. Though Twisted Metal and Burnout have been dormant for years, Carmageddon: Rogue Shift introduces a roguelite right turn to the genre, proving that while the vehicular combat genre often feels like a relic from a bygone era, it still has some gas left in the tank.
Rogue Shift is a post-apocalyptic, single-player racing game that takes the age-old formula of competing in crash-filled events and applies the roguelite formula to mostly strong results. Each time you fire up a new run, you select a vehicle from an ever-growing garage; I appreciate how each one not only controls differently, but features distinct weaponry and perks. I loved using the beefier vehicle I unlocked early on, which not only gave me more battering damage but more health, durability, and a special perk that increased my damage every time I improved my defense. This tank-like vehicle let me stay alive longer than the speedier, sportier options as I gained my bearings in Carmageddon: Rogue Shift. However, as I unlocked more vehicles and improved my skills, I started shifting towards those faster, less sturdy cars.
Once in a run, you navigate a menu-based map as you select the route to each phase’s boss encounter. I admire the risk/reward elements at play in choosing which way to go at every fork; do I want to head towards the weapons shop where I can upgrade my shotgun, even though there’s a more challenging Elite event right after it, or do I want to steer clear of the risk and just go on to the next standard event? When any failure, whether you miss the specified placement for the event or your vehicle is demolished, results in a game over and the end of your run, these decisions carry great weight. On multiple occasions, I fist-pumped as my risk paid off, but more often, I fell victim to my own hubris, and I watched helplessly as my vehicle exploded and my aspirations went up in smoke.
On the road, Carmageddon is an often-glorious symphony of explosions and speed. Most events are lap-based races, where you compete against a field of fellow armed-to-the-teeth racers as you jockey for position and aim for the checkered flag. Speeding through zombie-infested streets as you blast, smash, and bash your competition creates white-knuckled affairs where I found myself holding my breath until I crossed the finish line. Picking up ammo, locking onto your opponent, and blasting them sky high with whatever weapon you have equipped is a thrill only rivaled by the feeling of shoving your foe into a barricade and watching them explode like a firework to mark your triumph.
Every car controls differently, which is exacerbated by the disparate road surfaces and weather conditions, creating situations where one bad roll of the elements can bring your run to a screeching and demoralizing halt. This is particularly true because the controls don’t allow for fast recovery if you get turned around or caught on a jagged environmental element; with the game’s entire premise being based on vehicles wiping out, it takes entirely too long to course-correct if you get nudged off course. And since there’s no retry button outside of special items that grant you an extra life, frustration mounts when you spin out near the end of a race.
Since the controls are a little more slippery than I prefer in my arcade racers, every time I had an event with rain on a dirt road, I knew I had to focus extra hard to ensure I didn’t spin out on every high-speed turn. And since zombies walk across every racetrack, you also need to watch out for special variants that explode when you go near them. I enjoy smashing through the hordes of undead to earn bonus credits, but the post-apocalyptic setting is perhaps the least memorable part of the overall package; I would have had just as much fun taking part in these high-speed destruction derbies without zombies spilling into the streets.
Playing into the roguelite elements, you accumulate two kinds of currencies during your run: credits, which can be used at various shops within your run, and beatcoins, which are used at the Black Market dealer at the start of each run. The shops scattered throughout the map offer new perks, like boosts to your weapon damage, repairs to your vehicle, or one that converts the credits you earn into HP.
At first, building my preferred killing/racing machine often came down to the luck of the draw, as each shop is randomized, but through a permanent perk unlocked at the Black Market dealer, I could reroll each in-run shop once for free. The Black Market dealer, which you access at the start of every run, is where more meaningful upgrades that carry from run to run occur. Here, you can unlock permanent upgrades, like one that adds an extra item for sale in every shop, as well as new perks and weapons that cycle through the shops, plus new vehicles. These upgrades help keep the experience of racing the same handful of tracks over and over again feeling fresh.
Though survival is at the forefront of every race, and I always built to survive the next escalation of opponent, the boss battles were always at the forefront of my mind when determining my loadout. Though the pool of bosses is shallow, I always looked forward to taking on these decked-out adversaries. Whether you’re talking a bulldozing tank that blasts fire in all directions, a duo of bosses that blast projectiles at you until you destroy them, or a speedster that is nearly indestructible, these phase finales effectively shake up the pacing of your run, giving you a distinct experience from the more standard race events.
Even the most seemingly straightforward events have the potential to devolve into a chaotic pileup, which can be a blessing and a curse; it enhances the excitement, but I sometimes frustratingly got stuck sideways as opponents pushed me into a wall. You can force a respawn, but often by the time I did that, my chances for prevailing were long gone, even with some noticeable rubber-band AI; several times, I went into the final turn in first place, only to get spun out by an overly reckless AI opponent who sabotaged their own placement just to ruin my race. When you add to that the poor AI of the cop-like Enforcers, who more often than not steer into the walls, and a couple of times when the boss battles ended because the boss just decided to stop driving, it’s clear that these post-apocalyptic racers are lacking in the smarts department.
The AI would be a problem in a multiplayer game, but in a single-player title like Carmageddon: Rogue Shift, it’s a much more impactful issue. And really, the underwhelming enemy AI somewhat typified my experience with Carmageddon: Rogue Shift, as a persistent lack of polish permeates the experience. Muddy textures that pop in while you’re playing may not be the end of the world, but on a couple of occasions, my controls outright froze, disabling my ability to steer, leading to an unceremonious end to my run. It wasn’t a common problem, but it was frustrating enough to stick with me long after I stopped playing.
Even with some of those runs feeling like they came to an end due to little fault of my own, Carmageddon: Rogue Shift had me eagerly saying “one more run” time after time. This novel twist on vehicular combat may not be the full revival longtime genre fans have been craving, but it delivers a genre mashup I never knew I needed while simultaneously providing a fun callback to racing’s most explosive eras.
