>After 2 hours with my shiny new copy of Nascar Revolution, I have
arcade racer.
Read on:
First my system is a PII-333, overclocked to 375. I use
A Monster2 3DFX card with 8MB. I have 128MB RAM, and a
Storm VX (PCI) soundcard. My controller is an ACT Labs Force RS
wheel. I have DX 6.1 and the latest 3DFX reference drivers,
downloaded and installed last week from the 3Dfx main site.
I run N1999, GPL, Viper, NFS3, European Air War, Falcon4,
Tribes, Red Baron 3D, etc. on my system. I am in no way a Papyrus
worshipper.
Here we go:
The install (375MB) went normally. When I ran the game it only gave
me the option for Direct3D.No Glide.. hmmm.. Thinking perhaps it was
the new Glide drivers, I installed the Voodoo2 drivers from the
Nas Rev CD (which are DirectX5 drivers) and Nas Rev ran in Glide.
This thing is so truly bad, I don't know where to begin.
Let's start with the (very)few good qualities, move up to the
annoyances and finally work our way up to the ridiculous stuff
which will cause me to return it to Walden Software tomorrow.
I was pretty e***d about this game. From the demo, I could tell
that it looked great, had nice FF effects, and was running in
arcade mode with the promise of a 'sim' mode in the real game.
My expectations were that it would at least have equivalent
physics to N2/N1999 and that the rest of it would look and feel
very nice. I didn't expect it to have the physics of Viper or
GPL. I expected it to be quite a bit better than the "physics"
in NFS3. I love Viper and I like N1999. Sometimes I think that
GPL is not for me due to the inability to feel what the highly
modeled car is doing. I don't drive it much. I am saying this
because I want to show what I expected and my biases. I raced
lots of RL racecars for 15 years, mostly in SCCA. I also have
done a few outlaw stock car races in my time. I have been around
races and racecars a lot in my life. I love racing sims and
flying sims. O.K.?
Here we go:
* Good things:
1) Graphics. Nuf sed. It is gorgeous and runs smoothly on my
system at 640x480. For maximum smoothness, I had to reduce the
number of cars from 40+ to 20 or so to get what I consider to
be decent framerates at 800x600. Tracks look great, but popup
is horrendous, even with the highest setting. I give the graphics
engine a B- based on appearance and smoothness.
2) Sound. While I wish it was throatier the staccato thing works
nice with good back-off effects, etc. Not bad! Of course the
Benny Parsons chatter, etc. would probably grate on my nerves
after a while, but it was fun listening to it for the two hours
I played the game. Sound rating = B, IF you remove the CD from
the drive to end the nice, but ultimately annoying music.
3) Force Feedback. Not bad. It's not nearly as detailed as
Viper, but MUCH better than NFS3 or CMR. Push and wheel sliding
is easily detected, and overall it works pretty well. I would
give it a B.
Yes the above items are ALL that is decent about Nascar Revolution.
* Annoyances:
1) If you want to end the incessantly playing CD music, you
have to physically remove the CD from the drive. Nope, the music
slider won't help. The good news is that NasRev will run without
the CD.
2) Every time you take to the track, you will be swooped into the
scene in the external view. Nope you can't change it, and it doesn't
matter what your settings for the***pit view are, it forgets them
and you must reset them each time (while you are running 180mph).
3) Every time you want to leave the race or practice, you have to
watch your car zip around for a while and then it will finally
do what you want. Just like the demo. Nope, there is no way to
stop it...... Also, your force feedback wheel will be bashing back
and forth if your car happens to hit the wall or another car while
it continues to drive itself on the screen. I would say that this
process takes about 20-30 seconds EVERY time you want to quit.
* Ridiculous (deal breaker) stuff:
1) Sense of speed in***pit mode. NONE!! At 190 MPH it feels like
about 50MPH. It crawls with a capital C. Oh, if you like to get rid
of the***pit and drive in a forward view, or a rear arcade view,
the sense of speed is great. Also, the sense of speed in replays is
good.I don't like that, so I give sense of speed a D. If you like
a dashboard view, I promise that you have never seen a game or sim
with this low level of sense of speed.
2) Absolutely NO physics model in either the arcade, sim or 'custom'
mode. Catch this, you can swing your steering wheel quickly from lock
to lock at 180 MPH and not spin, or lose control of the car. Yup.
Hell, at high speeds, NFS* will spin from steering input.
Actually, you damn near have to hit something else or simply push
into the wall to lose control of your car. If you lessen the push,
the car is on rails. Period.
EXTREMELY canned over/understeer effects. Fair spin/crash effects,
but VERY scripted. I give Nascar Revolution's physics an F-.
If Nascar Revolution had 2/3 of the physics of, say, Gran Turismo
I could live with the rest, and probably enjoy the racing.
It has NO PHYSICS. You are warned.. :)
I could have continued to drive it and seen if the AI is good
or bad, and reported on other stuff, but at this point it doesn't
matter to me. Others can tell you about that, I can't stomach it.
Anyone who tries to equate Nascar Revolution to either N2/1999 or
Viper or GPL or ICR2 or NFS1 or MGPR* or GP2 or any of the other
sims and sim lites that we enjoy is simply WRONG. Just believe it and
forget buying this game.
Well, you ask, what about arcade mode for the arcade players? First,
let me say that I enjoy good arcade racers. I am not snobbish about
them at all if they are fun. I loved POD. I love Powerslide. I like
DethKarz, etc. etc. Nascar Revolution is WAY too dull to be a decent
arcade game. It just does NOT have the flash and pizazz necessary
to garner attention in that market.
So who will buy it? IMO, it will be bought by Nascar *fans* who want
to see their favorite drivers and cars whip around nicely rendered tracks.
They won't have to worry about crashing too much, even if they use a
keyboard or gamepad. It will show off their new system with it's nicely
realistic graphics. EA knows this, IMO, and since there are a *LOT*
of Nascar fans, they figure that this game will be successful
with the crowd it is designed for. (and it just might be very succesful).
That's O.K., there is room in the racing game world for all types of
products. I am just REALLY disappointed that this great looking title has
nothing to offer me. I am also amused at a couple of the posts that we
have already seen from users that love this game. I don't get it...
Oh well, back to Viper and N1999.
You are warned.. hehe..
--
rrevved posts from mindspring dot com