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Gaming Pathology

Gaming Pathology

Piles Of Games, Copious Free Time, No Standards

Category: Racing Games

Roketz

Posted on October 20, 2009 by Multimedia Mike

Sometimes, all I have to go on is a CD-ROM. That’s how it was with Roketz. Turns out it’s a DOS game. Time to fire up DOSBox and have at it. The credits, however, imply that there was also an Amiga version that preceded the DOS version.


Rocketz -- Story

I had some trouble making a go of this until I remembered to severely crank up the CPU cycles in DOSBox — this game was from 1996, after all. It’s also the first and only game I have seen which uses a 720×350 color graphics mode. The game is set in a dystopian future, probably — I think the preceding story screenshot was supposed to establish setting for this game. The art style is not in keeping with the rest of the game.


Roketz -- Gameplay

As for the game, it reminds me a lot of those Positech racing games I played quite some time ago. Race around a 2D map and shoot at other players while collecting powerups. This game functions in both free-for-all combat mode as well as lap racing mode.

There are also powerups to be purchased, including a teddy bear for good luck:


Rocketz -- Teddy bear powerup

The game was developed by an Estonian group called Bluemoon. They still have a functioning website where they claim credit for helping to create both Kazaa and Skype. And they created the beloved SkyRoads game. Both SkyRoads and Roketz are available for free download from their website

See Also:

  • Rocky Racers and Kombat Kars, which are somewhat similar to this game

At MobyGames:

  • SkyRoads series
Posted in Action Games DOS Games Racing Games | 1 Comment

iPhone Racing Games

Posted on June 25, 2009 by Multimedia Mike

I wanted to see how racing games played on the iPhone and iPod Touch. To that end, I downloaded and tried out 2 different 99-cent racing titles. The first is Concrete Combat Racing and it loads a curious warning:


Concrete Combat Racing -- Warning!

Intense gameplay. I’m sure that’s it; not bugs or anything. Anyway, let me see what my notes mention from my earlier encounter with this game… ah, here it is: “don’t like this game at all.”

The point of this game is to select a car for yourself and one for your computer opponent and then the 2 of you roll around the parking lot of infinity. You tilt the unit in different directions to steer the car but it’s very difficult to get used to, especially with another car firing bullets and missiles at you. I eventually gunned it in one direction to try to escape. But this parking lot just went on forever. The UI is also sort of mess with all of its buttons (gas and brake on left; 3 buttons on right; pause button at top). It makes me think that this is where the iPhone’s input limitations are revealed.


Concrete Combat Racing -- Gameplay

According to my other notes, the sound effects are crackly and otherwise unclean, the developers didn’t bother with their own soundtrack at all (probably assuming the player could just pick their own soundtrack from thousands of songs already on the unit), the control buttons don’t always seem to do what they say, and why are they driving on concrete anyway? It’s probably best not to ponder that last question too much but rather to move on to a much better iPhone racing game which is similarly bold enough to name the racing surface in the title…

Asphalt 4: Elite Racer is one in a series of Asphalt racing games that are exclusively developed for assorted handheld systems. It’s really quite fun even if I couldn’t get past the first race, held in Los Angeles:


Asphalt 4: Elite Racer: Avenue of Fame

You can tell it’s L.A. because the car is cruising along the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Err, make that the “Avenue of Fame,” as the game calls it. I suspect Hollywood has some potent intellectual property claims on the real thing. Just as well, though; the walk doesn’t look anything like the real deal.

This game has 3 control schemes to choose from and I experimented with each. The first is to touch the tall screen on either side in order to affect direction. The second is to tilt the screen side to side for steering. The third option has a little steering wheel on the bottom of the touch screen. I thought I would like the accelerometer tilting option the best but I had trouble keeping the car moving in a straight line. Control scheme 1 worked the best for me.

Elite Racer seems to come from that “illegal drag race” sub-genre of racing. You’re trying to force other players to crash while the fuzz is in hot pursuit. In fact, you can actually take down the heat, as I demonstrated here, quite by accident:


Asphalt 4: Elite Racer -- Taking down the law

Another feature of Elite Racer — which I understand is not especially uncommon in these underground-type racers — is the ability to unlock new female companionship as the levels progress.


Asphalt 4: Elite Racer -- Unlocking girls

It’s a tad disturbing, I realize, but it’s apparently a mainstay of the genre, based on this game and some other game trailers I’ve seen. It’s a curious concept — unlocking better women as you gain more skill.

Another facet of the game is automobile customization. I know that this game allows you to change the body color and rims. From what I’ve seen of more powerful underground racers on modern systems, customization is a serious part of the game. And I just realized that male gamers who put any serious effort into virtual automobile customization probably have little cause to ridicule female (or male, for that matter) gamers who get a kick out of dressing up characters in their favorite game franchises.

At the App Store:

  • Concrete Combat Racing
  • Asphalt 4: Elite Racing

At MobyGames:

  • Concrete Combat Racing
  • Asphalt 4: Elite Racing
  • Gameloft’s Asphalt Series
Posted in iPhone Games Racing Games | 1 Comment

Something New

Posted on June 3, 2008 by Multimedia Mike

I’m trying something new– I’m trying to be a bit more normal in my game-playing habits, at least for a while. I.e., instead of working this like a second job and forcing myself to choke down another unheard-of game that has maybe a 1 in 10 chance of being marginally tolerable and then writing up both an eloquent blog entry and a complete MobyGames entry, I decided to game a bit more “normally” and unwind with some known quantity-type games when I come home from work.

Both games already have complete MobyGames entries and there’s no need for me to even gather more screenshots for either. One is the GameCube remake of the original Resident Evil game. I think I actually picked up this game on release day — even though I didn’t even own a GameCube yet! (I had every intention of purchasing one, and I eventually got around to it, perhaps 6 months later.) I have always appreciated the succinct pre-title scene in a morgue of some sort. It highlights perhaps the smartest action ever taken in a horror movie-type situation:



The other game is a 2003 title that I just picked up used– F-Zero GX, also for the GameCube. I just started playing this and the first thing that confuses me is why the game bothers to present so much on-screen information– I can’t possibly afford to avert my gaze from the insane action to actually study what any of it says. I look forward to improving to the point where that’s possible.

See Also:

  • I actually got bored of this Resident Evil game fairly quickly
  • I had more fun playing Resident Evil 4 once again

At MobyGames:

  • Resident Evil (GameCube)
  • F-Zero GX
Posted in Action Games Adventure Games GameCube Games Racing Games | Tagged f-zero resident evil | Leave a comment

More NES Racing

Posted on April 1, 2008 by Multimedia Mike

Some fellow MobyGamers are steadily whittling away at my list of missing NES games. I thought tonight would be a good night to attack a few more NES titles that looked interesting before they all get snatched up for entry. And I thought I had already purged the NES list of all racing titles. But I found 2 more to play tonight, one that even has “race” in the title.

That race-named title is Race America. The most notable aspect of this game is the opponents– a colorful gallery of 8 brazen stereotypes, such as Mike Linguini here:


Race America — Mike Linguini, Italian stereotype

I suspect Google will soon pick that up as its top image search for “italian stereotype”. Other competitors include Ito Speedo, Pierce Sedan, and Hans Von Brakemann.

Other interesting aspects of this racer include its diversity of perspectives and its control scheme. Depending on the phase of the race, the action might be third-person, side-scrolling, or top-down. You are either allotted 1/2 or 1/4 of the screen depending on whether you are in the lead. And the screen shift can be quite disorienting when you gain or lose that lead.


Race America — Racing action

The control system took a little figuring out. At first, I couldn’t figure out how to move. Then I managed to move but ever so slowly. It was like a race car stuck in 1st — only literally! Eventually, I reasoned out how the control system works (for anyone scouring the internet for help on this forgotten title): Up and down on the control pad upshift and downshift, respectively. However, these only work if you are not pressing the gas button (A).

Oh, and there is more than one way to lose, and the game spells out your failures in a very public manner. This is me losing because I ran out of gas:


Race America — Out of gas

The second game tonight was Stunt Kids. I don’t have much to say about this one except that I suspect it’s an Excitebike clone. I can’t be certain at this time because I have never played Excitebike.


Stunt Kids go flying

I wasn’t very good at this game. I spent most of the game flying off my bike. The computer beat me handily but I think I was only racing against the clock.

Posted in NES Games Racing Games | Leave a comment

1997 In 1 Travel Game

Posted on June 16, 2007 by Multimedia Mike

So I was flying internationally and there was an onboard duty-free shop. Since I wouldn’t be doing much with this blog during my absence, I just knew I just had to buy this thing and write it up when I returned: Travel Game 1997 In 1 from Premier Portfolio.


1997 In 1

The feature list is a tad sparse. To wit:

  • 1997 in 1
  • Folding design
  • Sound on/off button
  • Batteries included
  • 12 month int. guarantee

Understandably, you might be a wee bit suspicious of the claim that this wondrous little device actually contains one thousand nine hundred and ninety-seven unique games. My first guess was that it had one game and 1997 different levels for that one game. At best, I figured that it would have several different games and hundreds of levels for each.

This latter assumption turns out to be correct. There are, in fact, 14 unique games listed on the tri-lingual instruction manual– err, instruction scrap-of-paper. Several of them, however, are the same concept repeated over and over again.

On a technical level, the game screen has a tall rectangle drawn around the left 3/4. This is the area that contains 200 individually-addressed picture elements arranged in a 10×20 grid. The right quarter has a few other hardwired elements such as the score. There is a speaker that sounds like one synthesized channel which can still produce a useful array of sound effects. The controls allow you to select among the 14 games, play them, force a hard reset to select a new game, and toggle the sound. Further, when starting the system, “MIRADA” scrolls across the screen. Developer, perhaps? I didn’t have time to disassemble the unit to learn more, though the screws are straightforward enough.

Among the 14 games, 3 of them are racing games– “Car Racing”, “2-line Car Racing”, and “3-line Car Racing”. The 3-line car racing game is depicted below (it’s notoriously difficult to obtain quality screenshots on this system):


1997 In 1 -- Racing Game

The mechanics of all 3 games are the same. You can move to the left or right or speed up (since the car moves pretty slow by default). The car racing game just has the player maneuvering on a narrow race track. The 2- and 3-line car racing games have cars in 2 or 3 lanes that you must dodge.

There is a “Tank Fighting” game where you navigate your tank around the field and shoot other tanks will avoiding obstacles. The tanks each occupy 3×3 grid blocks so it’s a pretty crowded game.

A game called “Shooting” simply has a bunch of blocks gradually but relentlessly descending. Shoot them before they reach you.

There is “Single Pinball” and “Double Pinball”. They are both Breakout/Arkanoid-type games. They also strike me as somewhat flawed. It can probably be proven mathematically given the constraints of the system, but I was able to show empirically that it was easy to get the game into a state where the ball followed the same pattern and could not clear a screen until you let the ball drop. The double pinball game differs from the single variant in that there is a paddle at the top of the screen that you are controlling simultaneously with the one on the bottom. I.e., there is no hard border at the top.

I assumed that the game “Shooting Space” would be a Space Invaders clone. In fact, I have never seen anything quite like it. One row of random blocks descends one level, followed slowly by another. You have to shoot more blocks upwards in order to complete lines and keep the blocks from reaching the lower level. It’s sort of like an inverted Tetris.

Speaking of Tetris, this type of hardware lends itself quite naturally to a Tetris-type game. However, it is simply called “Block Game” in this incarnation. This is what it looks like:


1997 In 1 -- Block Game (Tetris)

So I can understand why they would shy away from using the name Tetris. But that doesn’t square with the fact that they openly call their Galaxian clone “Galaxian”.

“Cross The Fire Line” is a Frogger clone when it comes right down to it while “Dragon Pearl” is a variation of the common Nibbles theme.

The unit also has a game called “Crazy Ball” which I think is supposed to be a Pong-type game. I’ve never played the original Pong so I don’t know if Pong is supposed to be this naive. The computer player simply moves back and forth in a constant manner. It’s still hard to beat the computer since the paddle is 1/3 the width of the screen.

One last game– It’s called “Block Matching” and it struck me as the strangest. There would be 3 blocks at the bottom of the screen, e.g.:

  XX  X  X
  XX  X  XX

3 blocks slowly descend from the top of the screen, Tetris-style. They do not initially match the blocks in the same position on the bottom of the screen. It is your job to alter the blocks within the group in order to make them match the bottom blocks before the group reaches the bottom. The left arrow rotates through block types for the first block, up or down controls the second block, and right manages the third.

I bought this odd item on my way back to the U.S. and my first stop was to visit some relatives. My young nephew seemed far more impressed with this device than I was. So I just collected enough notes for this post and let him have it. I’m glad it will get some use.

Posted in Action Games Puzzle Games Racing Games Shooter Games | 5 Comments

Gran Turismo: NES

Posted on March 31, 2007 by Multimedia Mike

I would like to start tonight’s entry with a neo-cubist geographical interpretation of the United States:


Formula One: Born To Win -- neo-cubism and the United States

Continuing with the high-speed theme from last night’s post, I made a push tonight to get more old NES racing games into MobyGames. I came to realize I was quite spoiled with the types of racing games I played on the NES and SNES. Games like The Adventures of Bayou Billy, The Mafat Conspiracy, Rad Racer II, RoadBlasters and F-Zero come to mind. These were pretty much “on-rails” where not much could go wrong. These games often involved munitions of some sort, too. So it was somewhat a shock to discover that the NES was capable of hosting more considerate and faithful racing games. In particular, I played 3 separate formula one racing games.

The first game is Formula One: Born To Win and it was the source of the above odd screenshot. The F-1 racing aspect is apparently something you have to earn your way up to. The game is more of a career racer in the vein of (what I make of) the popular Gran Turismo series. You begin the game with a Mini Cooper (well before their resurgent popularity!), compete in low-grade races, earn money to upgrade the vehicle to be more competitive, claw your way up the racing circuit, and eventually earn the opportunity to race Vector, Ferrari, and F-1 vehicles. I was a bit intimidated when I saw the stat screen:


Formula One: Born To Win -- Mini Cooper car check

Fortunately, when you screw up, the nice lady in the race official’s office advises you about what part of your car to upgrade to do better next time. For example, upgrade the chassis if bumping into another car causes you to spin out of control.

2 celebrity-licensed games I played were Michael Andretti’s World GP and Nigel Mansell’s World Championship Challenge. They each have 16 international courses for F-1 racing. However, Andretti’s title was easily the most intense racing experience I had yet seen on the NES. First, there was head-to-head, 2-player, split-screen racing which impressed me greatly. The racing action requires you to worry about shifting and if you corner too hard, you can easily spin out. This is a racer that takes some serious practice.


Michael Andretti's World GP
Split-screen 2-player starting line sequence in Michael Andretti’s World GP

Another racing game (I assumed it was such due the the word ‘race’ in its title) I played today was Death Race. After playing, and by sheer coincidence, I happened upon this review which alerted me to the fact that Death Race 2000 was a Sly Stallone movie made in 1975. This is the bad game of today’s bunch, hardly surprising considering it was an adaptation of a B-movie made 15 years prior and was further an unlicensed NES game published by an extraordinarily generic-sounding company named American Game Cartridges (proving that the only thing worse than licensed schlock is unlicensed schlock). Even stranger is that there was actually an arcade game based on the movie that made its way to video arcades in 1976. It was perhaps the first truly controversial video game if Wikipedia is to be believed on the matter. The thrust of the game is to soup up your car to run down pedestrians and win races by capturing flags and finding exit doors.


Death Race

One final observation: Isn’t it oddly convenient that cars in 8-bit racers can never go faster than 255 distance units/hour?

Posted in NES Games Racing Games | 1 Comment

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