BlazeRush is a racing game that’s silly and pure fun, and very much the spiritual successor of old 2D racing games like Rock n’ Roll Racing, RC Pro AM, Super Sprint, Skidmarks, Racing Destruction Set, and Super Off Road.
Read More
Thankfully I was able to get a lot of enjoyment out a few of the included offerings. Joust and Joust 2 hold up extremely well, as do Satan’s Hollow, Robotron 2084, Spy Hunter, Rampage, and both Gauntlet games (just don’t shoot the food!). Two titles I’d never played before, Wizard of Wor and Bubbles, ended up being my favorites. Smash TV and its sequel Total Carnage also play well with a modern controller, and they still serve as a reminder that most of these games were simply designed to get one more quarter out of the pocket of your Kangaroos. This is certainly a staunch contrast from the “save anywhere, unlimited lives” mentality that permeates game design today.
Read More
In addition to the missiles, the courses feature some hazards of their own, though mostly less extreme! They include the mildly inconvenient water and oil spills and broken/damaged surfaces (including a jump or two), and the more dangerous mines and retractable spikes. Some courses, particularly later ones, also feature the ‘gates’, first seen in Super Sprint, which allow short cuts, but only when they are open. Timing the use of these well can often make the difference between first and last place!
Read More
There can’t be too many people that don’t know all about Super Sprint, and there’s not really too much that you can say about it. It was a simple game, even compared to others of the time. It’s based on either Formula One or Indy/Cart racing (probably the latter considering how unpopular F1 is in the US) and can be played by between one and three players simultaneously, whilst a fourth ‘drone’ car is controlled by the computer. This was before the days of linking machines together of course, so this is achieved by presenting each course in its entirety from an overhead perspective.
Read More