Zdravstvuyte i dobro pozhalovat' v Video obzory igr ToriJ -kh godov. Okay, I'm officially declaring December, Funcember, because we have a lot of fun games lined up this month, and we're starting out with San Francisco Rush Extreme Racing! My first racing game since 2012. That's a long time to go without a single racing game. Why did I ever stop?
All right, after you take a cue tip to dust out the cartridge, and turn the system on and off a couple of time to get it working, the game will start right off. From Atari and Midway, remember those guys? Good times. If you just want to race you can select One Race and go from there. You have a couple of maps to choose from with a set difficulty rate, and every map has short cuts you can discover to increase your chances of winning. There's nothing like a game which encourages cheating. The cars are separated by difficulty too, and there are eight cars overall, giving you your choice of color and the usual automatic and manual setting. Manual is a terrible setting. You put it on the highest possible setting you can get it, and you'd still be lagging behind the other cars. Automatic is just an all around more enjoyable experience.
http://i61.:bou::bou::bou::bou::bou:...ou:/s60hs8.png
Except when this happens. You know what, the next time someone asks me why I don't drive, I'm just going to show them this picture. I think it summarizes all the the reasons why I should NEVER be allowed behind the wheel.
Notice the number counting down on the top right corner of the screen? That's your timer. In each course there are several checkpoints you need to reach in order to get more time. If you run out of time the race will automatically end and you'll get a game over. Which would be bad, if you didn't get a game over for finishing the race anyway. I think someone didn't understand how the game over screen works. The object of the game is to go fast, only problem is the faster you go, the most likely you are to crash.
Those corners are like ninjas, extremely deadly and they'll stealth kill you. I have to slow down just to turn! You also have places on the road where you can jump up through the air. It's actually a pretty cool way to pick up speed, and you can jump over cars. A lot like this:
As the name would imply, every single course takes place in San Francisco. On the first track you get to drive across the Golden Gate Bridge which is probably as close as perfect to an introduction as you can get. Far as I can tell none of these races are authorized, one course has a bunch of buses passing you by as obstacles! Where are the police at? Between demons, and the Tanner family, San Francisco is a dangerous place to live. Another thing to keep in mind is that your car can be pretty badly damaged.
If you hit the walls, or other cars (and cars will hit back) it damages the car enough to where it looks like it really did come out of an action movie. Rush even has action movie car logic that if you so much as hit something slightly, or flip over, the car will explode. Was there a gas leak or did somebody put a bomb in the car!? There are enough explosions in this game to fill up a Michael Bay movie. Don't believe me? Start the slide show!
Let's look at Circuit. Basically, you make a profile, pick your car, and you go through multiple different tracks and try to earn as many points as you can each race to get to the top. There isn't much to it than that. They will however pick all of the hardest tracks they possibly can, and make you race them over and over again.
The only other mode available is practice where you can try to decrease the number of times you crash and die. The shortcuts you can find are pretty neat, also. I managed to find one that was on rooftops and you had to keep jumping higher and higher to get over them. I didn't go high enough.
Rush goes up to two player with a split-screen across the middle, making it progressively harder to see where you're going. You can see the things on your sides okay, but everything in front of you is kind of difficult to grasp, and the map is like barely visible on the screen. If you so much as look in that direction it's like texting and driving. If you don't have the skills you're going to end up in a melodramatic PSA commercial.
Last, but certainly not least, is the music! This game has a bunch of busting tracks to listen to while you're racing and/or crashing. Most of all who could forget the tune that plays after you finish a race?
Rush is available on the Nintendo 64, and Sony PlayStation. I only played the N64 version so that the only one I can vouch for as being good. But if the PlayStation is all you can find it on then go for it. If you like racing games with challenging tracks, fun beats, and lots of explosions, this game was tailor made for you!
Get it
By the way, that person racing with me for the screenshot? My nephew. He's bad at racing games so I tricked him into playing it with me by saying whoever crashes the most cars wins. He even let me record it! I love kids, I really do.
Let me know what you think about Rush in the comments below, and what games you'd like to see me play in the future?
Toriy podpisaniya proch'.
12-23-2014, 08:03 PM
Fox
Oh! This looks like a slightly different version to Rush 2048 that my dad and I had for the Dreamcast. The cars in that one had pop-out wings and you could do wicked stunts with them. Remains one of my favourite racing games ^^
12-23-2014, 08:09 PM
Ayen
Rush 2048 was one of the sequels. This was the first game in the series. There are four games overall. I plan to track down the rest of the series to review.
12-23-2014, 08:10 PM
Fox
Good luck! I really wish they'd re-release them on Steam or GoG. Such good games.
12-23-2014, 08:14 PM
Ayen
Do they release many games on Steam that didn't originally have a PC version?
12-23-2014, 09:06 PM
Fox
Not sure I'd say many. But you do get those retro packs every now and then. A few bits from the Dreamcast have made their way over and that only had like 4 games anyway!
12-23-2014, 09:08 PM
Ayen
Cool. I think the main contributing factor Rush isn't on Steam is because Midway went bankrupt. I don't know if anyone owns the rights to it now or not, and if there's no one to collect the money there's nothing to sell.
