There’s a fine line between glorious chaos and tedious wreckage, and Instruments of Destruction spends most of its time on the wrong side of it. The premise is simple – drive bizarre vehicles around deserted islands and reduce buildings to rubble. It sounds like blissful carnage, but in practice, it’s more like watching paint dry… if the paint occasionally fell over in slow motion.
Gaming Heaven
To be fair, the destruction physics look impressive at first glance. Walls crumble, girders twist, and debris flies in a convincing enough manner to make you briefly think you’re having fun. The range of vehicles is imaginative – bulldozers, catapult contraptions, and something resembling a weaponised tumble dryer. There’s even a sandbox mode where you can build your own machines.
Gaming Hell
The game’s main problem is that it confuses destruction with entertainment. Smashing buildings should feel exhilarating, but here it’s strangely dull – every mission quickly blurs into the same slow, dusty collapse. The physics engine, while ambitious, can’t quite deliver satisfying structural drama: buildings tend to sag sadly rather than topple dramatically, like a soufflé that’s given up on life. The controls are clunky, and vehicles often feel like they were designed to handle with all the grace of a shopping trolley on an ice rink. Even the challenges lack purpose; you’re given objectives, but none of them seem to matter.
Final Judgement
Instruments of Destruction promises gleeful mayhem but delivers repetitive tedium. It’s the gaming equivalent of smashing toy blocks with a hammer – fun for five minutes, then exhausting. Unless your idea of excitement is slowly bulldozing sadness into pixelated dust, steer clear.
