There's more to the Hulk than just walking around smashing things – there are several ways in which you can smash things. First, Hulk can sprint forward a few steps and trample average and small things and people. He has two main attack buttons and does a fair bit of damage with only those simple movements – like destroying small vehicles and buildings piece by piece. But it gets better.

He can also jump and power jump by holding down and then releasing the jump button. He'll launch himself way up and land wherever you guide him. When he lands, he leaves huge cracks in the ground and dents in buildings and pavement. He can also travel a fair distance by jumping, particularly if you start from a high point.

When you come across a nice, big vehicle or chunk of metal like, say, a truck, you can smash it into two big pieces and wrap it around your hands. The game anoints this practice "steel hands" and it lends a little more weight to your blows. If you don't like that look, just throw the whole truck at something. You can lock on to targets for better luck or just start tossing chunks of anything in your prey's general direction. This is a great technique for knocking helicopters out of the air, and if you angle your throw just right and power it up, Hulk can hurl debris clear out of your range of vision.

Once you get really good at aiming your jumps you can just jump up to the helicopter and beat on it in midair. If you can't quite jump to the top of a building, you can just smash your hands into it and climb it or run up the wall. These are just examples of the Hulk's starting abilities because you'll gain even more as you progress. Everything about the game works toward one goal – to give the player the feeling of being in control of the strongest, angriest creature on the planet.

And what makes that work even better is the fact that nearly everything on screen is a target. The tower you just knocked over can be smashed again, and the huge chunks can be thrown at the building on the other side of the screen. The vehicles you destroy turn into ammunition until they finally explode in a shower of shrapnel and sparks. Granted, there are a lot more propane tanks laying around just waiting to blow up than should normally be the case, but who cares? This is not a real-life simulation.

The excuse for putting the power of the Hulk at your fingertips is a story about an overzealous military contractor out to stop the Hulk, and it works just fine. Your missions revolve around getting away from trouble at some times and going looking for it at other times. The variety is largely up to you, because the goals themselves are pretty straightforward, but how you go about destroying any given area is left up to personal preference.

The only thing holding Ultimate Destruction back from hands-down, must-have status is the quality of the graphics. Objects and characters are relatively blocky and grainy. The game looks fine for what it is – a smash-fest, but it's not a lesson in detail. It seems wrong to knock a game that's this much fun just because the eye candy isn't the main selling point, but fair is fair, and the game could have looked better.

Quibbles aside, Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction is a blast to play. It's very easy to pick up and satisfying. The essence of the Hulk – his chaotic power and affect on normal civilization – is captured perfectly. The game ends long before the giddiness of smashing your way through puny humans and their best military efforts wears thin.