GTC AFRICA. Publisher: Empire Interactive. Format: PS2: CAST your eye over the publicity for a PS2 driving game and one word crops up time after time: realism.

It stems from when Gran Turismo games companies started toiling over their new titles to create ever more lifelike recreations of driving a car at racing speeds.

Laudable as that may be, those efforts have taken driving games up something of a motoring cul-de-sac. Some of today's racing titles are more about tinkering with suspension settings and agonising over hot camshafts than actually getting out on a circuit.

Whisper it softly, but I reckon more than a few of these "realistic" games are just a little bit, err, boring. After all, Michael Schumacher doesn't stay up till the early hours during a Grand Prix weekend fiddling with the springs and dampers of his Ferrari. He de-briefs the crew after practice and they do the fettling for him. All Schumie has to do is get in the car and drive.

All isn't lost, though. There are a handful of old school racers still available - games that tear up the physics rule book in favour of having a good time. Perhaps the best known are the Ridge Racer series of games - every one of them a rollicking good drive - but now we have two other challengers: GTC Africa and Rallisport Challenge.

First up is GTC Africa, a driving game that takes the fun of rallying and combines it with the excitement of a circuit race. It may be set in Africa but there's a lot more to GTC than sand and dust. There are 19 different championship circuits in a host of exotic locales. As well as the ubiquitous cart tracks, some of them are set on city streets (just like Project Gotham Racing on the Xbox) while others take your car through lush forests where rocks and outcropping vegetation lie in wait for the foolhardy driver.

Thankfully, the game errs on the side of arcade action, so minor driving indiscretions that would have your car off the road in real life are kindly overlooked.

The steering is less twitchy than usual and all the better for it because novice gamers so often overcompensate when their car starts to slide, only to end up buried in the scenery.

Your opponents (there are up to six cars on screen simultaneously) will sometimes try to have you off the road as you overtake, so watch out for dirty tricks.

At the end of each race, the game displays your results, including position, time, car damage, bonus/penalties, and team status.

If a championship season is too much bother, there is always the time challenge, and a two-player mode. Alternatively, there's a challenge mode, which offers features 11 additional tracks packed with such things as time trials, hill climbs and descents; and speed challenges.

RALLISPORT CHALLENGE 2. Publisher: Microsoft. Format: Xbox. Price: £39.99: JUST to prove that anything the PS2 can do, the Xbox can do better, Microsoft puts the pedal to the metal once more for Rallisport 2.

The first Rallisport got lost in the hullabaloo of the Xbox launch and the approbation heaped on Halo. Looking back now, it's clear to see it was every bit as good as anything in the launch line-up, Halo included.

The sequel has arrived ahead of Halo 2, so this time it stands a good chance of stepping out the shadow and doing well at a time of the year when decent games are in short supply.

The visual effects have been ramped up to a whole new level. The first game was hardly a graphical slouch but this time Rallisport leaves its console rivals gasping in the dust.

Rain, dust, snow and fog are all recreated in such loving detail that sometimes it seems like you are watching Channel 4's rally programme and not participating in a game at all.

As with GTC Africa, Rallisport is an arcade action game first and a simulation second. It may lack the nerdish attention to detail shared by other rally titles but it more than makes up for that with its addictive game play and plain, old-fashioned fun.

You can play the game at various difficulty levels. The easiest is the perfect way for a novice to ease themselves in, whereas the champion setting really tests your driving mettle. The pro setting is a happy medium between the two.

Even better news for broadband users - Rallisport 2 can be played online, meaning up to 16 petrol heads can meet up in cyberspace for the ultimate off-road dust up.

Is it the best rally game on the Xbox? It's certainly up with the best of 'em. Is it the best arcade racer on the Xbox? Undoubtedly.