Old shool racers

[RobinVinter]

I'm far, far away from the first one to notice but man the racing genre sure feels creatively bankrupt nowadays (and the whole reaction to NFS Unbound sure as hell isn't encouraging). Taking a peek down the rabbit hole though in recent days on old racing games got me floored at some of the variety. Japanese niches like touge and highway racing, the insanity that is Burnout, futuristic ones like F-Zero and Wipeout... Basically this has been my obsession this last week since I missed most of these when they were relevant. Y'all have any memories to share? I mostly remember crashing cars (deliberately) in Colin Mcrae Rally 3 and beating my dad in Gran Turismo 4 with the dirtiest of driving (glad to hear the nostalgia for this one is mostly justified though ).

[kkzero]

I believe my progression in racing games as a kid was something like two Hotwheels games for the GameCube, then a bit of exposure to Sonic Riders on a family-friend's Wii, then some Mario Kart things over the years, as well as a dabbling of that racing game for the Leapfrog Didj. I tried some F-Zero X more recently, it's hard but a banger.

I also got surprised taking a second look at Stunt Race FX for the SNES some months back, after feeling let down by my first try. It's surprisingly fun and imaginative, with the only real drawback being the framerate.

[Jess]

Man, I feel like Stunt Race FX would be a great game if it ran at a better speed. It's so silly and some of the stage design is really creative, despite the limitations. That game doesn't get nearly the attention that Star Fox does though, unfortunately

[NinTheFolf]

I will always have a soft spot for Enduro Racer as it was my first racing game of sorts I played as a kid, and looking that up apparently we got robbed of 5 tracks when it was localized??? I always thought it was really odd that there were 5 boards you'd play on twice. |:

[RobinVinter]

I also got surprised taking a second look at Stunt Race FX for the SNES some months back, after feeling let down by my first try. It's surprisingly fun and imaginative, with the only real drawback being the framerate.

Suppose I'll have to give it a go then, been hearing murmurs here and there of it but the framerate always put me off
From what I've seen though it does look goofy af x3

[Foxxhoria]

Love F-Zero, WipEout and the F.A.S.T. series, and then of course I've played a lot of Mario Kart hehe, cus who hasn't. I'm definitely not big on racing games, but there are a bunch of cool ones indeed!

I've more recently been enjoying Virtua Racing Deluxe on my 32X and then (to the extent that it's "racing") Outrun (the Saturn port) and Outrun 2 (on the Xbox)! I have Sega Rally for the Saturn as well though haven't yet played it so much heheh. I want to check out Daytona USA (1 & 2) at some point too, but the port situation with that seems a bit more complex, eheh.

One that's not talked about enough (perhaps understandably) that I enjoy though is POD, the grungy racing game on PC that's notoriously difficult to get running on original hardware haha. It fortunately has a modern update on GoG for anyone curious though :P There's also a sequel on the Dreamcast!! Though it's not quite such a good game. But it is still neat in that it can be played over the phone line heh, so with a DreamPi I can play it with friends :3 Outrun 2 is also really cool that way, using Xlink Kai!!!

Oh and speaking of the Dreamcast (and pods...?), there's also the two Star Wars Pod Racing games! People seem to talk more fondly about Episode 1 Racer, but I grew up with Racer Revenge, so have more of my own fond memories with that one heh. Perhaps Episode 1 Racer feels a bit more impressive on the N64; it's graphically a bit simple on the Dreamcast but it's still definitely a good game heh!

two Hotwheels games for the GameCube

Oh, was one of those by any chance Velocity X?
I had that on the PS2, and yeah, I consider it an underrated gem hehe. Other Hot Wheels games are all about being toys and simply racing, but Velocity X instead was its own little world for them that you could roam around at your leisure! I still sometimes put it in to just drive around the maps on joyride; it has a lot of nice little details in them to make them feel believable and a great sense of motion while doing the driving and going around the funky loops and twists and ramps!

[kkzero]

Oh, was one of those by any chance Velocity X?
I had that on the PS2, and yeah, I consider it an underrated gem hehe. Other Hot Wheels games are all about being toys and simply racing, but Velocity X instead was its own little world for them that you could roam around at your leisure! I still sometimes put it in to just drive around the maps on joyride; it has a lot of nice little details in them to make them feel believable and a great sense of motion while doing the driving and going around the funky loops and twists and ramps!

Yeah Velocity X was one my cousins had on GC but not me, so I only got to experience a bit of the free play racing modes whilst being heckled for picking "the slow car" (i.e. the green one versus the orange/red one). The one I did own on GC was World Race, which was pretty standard car racing but it was fun and had a banger soundtrack.

I did actually own the GBA version of Velocity X though. I was so close to beating the story mode as a kid but couldn't get past the last mission. I also remember finding the main villain's character design really cool.

[Jess]

I've played a lot of Mario Kart hehe, cus who hasn't

it's me, I'm "who hasn't" I played super mario kart, and then a long stretch of time passed where absolutely nothing happened, and then I played mario kart 8

they changed some things in that time

[NinTheFolf]

After getting some sleep, I finally found the other racing game I wanted to bring up. Though I can't find much about it, here's a small video showing some of Gadget Racers for the PS2

I had this as a kid and loved it. It has the loop of do races, get money, spend money on better car parts, repeat. Need more speed underwater? Buy a propeller to slap on the back of your car. Need more distance on jumps? Buy wings.

Like, I remember it being very silly like that but a lot of fun. I'm also just a sucker for games with RPG-esque mechanics that aren't RPGs.

[RobinVinter]

Alright, after giving Ridge Racer Type 4 a proper shot without the buzz of a convention surrounding me I must say I'm quite impressed. I think the last time I felt akin to this was with Horizon Chase Turbo where you can tell the focus was on fun racing first and foremost. The circuits are decently varied visually, gorgeous and a joy to drive through. As for the driving itself I found track knowledge was often rewarded and even with drift as a crutch knowing when you could take the racing line with the gas pedal floored was key when racing for a higher level team. On the other hand the difficulty scales down nicely while keeping the same, solid core.

I recommend giving it a try! If you can't get a physical copy it's supposedly available to PS Gold subs or whatever it's called, I can't verify because my PS2 won't connect to the wifi.