Driven: Peugeot 208 1.2 VTi Active It's done it: Peugeot has reinvented the steering wheel. Oh all right, it's just made it smaller, but the effect is remarkable. It makes driving the handsome 208 like piloting one of those little Tomy Turnin" Turbo driving simulators from the Eighties, wheel in your lap, tearing along the open highway as your big sister annoys you by dancing to the Grease megamix. The wheel is just one of many brilliant things about the 208. Peugeot made a rod for its own back with its magnifique 205, a car so perfect in design and execution that it made its two successors, the stodgy 206 and flabby 207, seem hopeless. Now though, nearly 30 years later, it has produced a worthy follow-up. It's not just that the 208 is fun to drive, which it is, but that it also rides well, is roomy (more so than the 207, despite being smaller on the outside) and has excellent visibility, with narrow A-pillars and big windows. And it is much lighter than the 207 - our car weighed just 975kg. The interior is a paragon of modern simplicity, with just three buttons and three dials for the heating and everything else taken care of via a smart touch-screen display. Where Peugeot's big 508 can be frustratingly overcomplicated, the 208 shows that it can still do stylish practicality better than anybody. The three-cylinder petrol engine might only have 82bhp, but it's a gem from tickover to the redline, with enough poke to be entertaining and a charismatic soundtrack. It's mated to a light yet accurate five-speed gearbox and still returns 50mpg when you give it the full beans. There is a caveat though, and for that we have to go full circle back to that little steering wheel. Because in changing the fundamental driving position Peugeot is asking a lot of its customers. It reckons that 80 per cent will love it - and I'm one of them - but that leaves 20 per cent for whom it just feels odd. Bad luck to them I say, for they'll be missing out on a really charming little car. Peugeot 208 1.2 VTi Active Price as tested: £13,560