Playing the modern reboot of “Twisted Metal,” I felt like a classic-car buff looking under the hood of a modern vehicle. What is all this? Like the 1995 original, it’s essentially a “Mad Max” rip-off. The game puts you in control of a car competing in a destruction derby, except in this destruction derby, all the cars are outfitted with machine guns and rocket launchers.

This eighth “Twisted Metal’s” great curse, though, is that it arrives after 1996’s “Twisted Metal 2.” That first sequel wasn’t afraid to be funny, or take the kinds of chances you don’t see much in games anymore. Who couldn’t love smashing your competition as a front-end loader, or playing as a Formula 1 car whose specialty was to inexplicably turn into a tornado, usually doing more damage to itself than enemy cars?