I actually went out looking to buy Leadfoot yesterday when I heard
some people were finding it on shelves. I went to EB, Babbages, Best
Buy, and even (gasp) Wal-Mart looking for it. Wal-Mart was my last
ditch effort only because they had Dirt Track Racing before anyone
else way back when.
I was glad to see the demo posted on Avault today, and it was pretty
small to boot. I'm a big fan of off-road motorsports, and thought I'd
post some comments about the game.
Test system: Home built P3-866, Elsa Gladiac GeForce2 MX, SoundBlaster
Live!, 256meg RAM.
Graphics: Fair. The track and truck models are simple, but nice.
A few more polys would make them look a lot more substantial.
Like the other Ratbag title I own, Dirt Track Racing, everything looks
pretty basic. The main problem for me is with the vehicle textures.
Like DTR, they still have the over-blurred effects reminiscent of
first generation 3D accelerated games. The in truck view has a nice
perspective with a good view, but the dash is a blurry mess compared
with newer (and even lots of older) games.
The white track boundries also have the over blurred effect, but the
barricades, signs and metal Start/Finish line structure look nice.
There is a good looking dust effect done as sort of a fog, but there
are no thrown particles like on the moldy-oldy SODA.
The DTR like disappearing skid marks are still present, and kind of
bogus.
Sound: Not so hot. The trucks sound reminiscent of V8's, although they
aren't supposed to be. This is kind of hard to pin down, but the
engine sounds seem like they were recorded low, and then either
over-amplified, or really doctored up to try to make them sound
better. Same effect as DTR, and it isn't very convincing.
The buggies sound like a modified version of the truck sound, and are
nothing like the single cylinder 2 strokes I equate with these
vehicles (or even a single cylinder four stroke for that matter).
Tracks: This is going to be short, since there are only two tracks in
the demo. The 2 demo tracks are relatively smooth, with graceful,
flowing jumps, and none of the chop and braking bumps that were
included in the SODA tracks. Maybe someone with the full version can
chime in on this.
I like the design of both demo tracks, and really enjoyed racing on
the Bevan track.
Feel: Ratbag continues the tradition of having a pretty convincing
packed-dirt slide model. On 100% realistic, I felt the trucks slid
just a little too much in the corners, not accounting for the side
bite the tires would create when the vehicle spun.
Backing this off to about 75-80% made it feel much more predictable,
and like the eastern dirt I've slid around on in my CJ-7.
There are substantial vehicle setup options, but you can't tweak them
in the demo. Caster, camber, tire pressure, wheel size, brake
strength, and steering lock are all have adjustment settings shown.
There is also a provision for saving and loading setups.
If you switch back and forth from the buggies to the trucks, you can
"feel" the weight and slower reactions of the trucks. Very nice.
The force feedback effects felt pretty minimal, but I hate to make a
call on them before fiddling with the setup.
There is split axis support, but its rendered worthless by the fact
that the gas is still shut down when you press the brake, just as if
you were using single axis. Too bad, since this kind of driving suits
itself well to feathering the gas and brake at the same time.
Interface: The interface is simple and intuitive. Perhaps a little too
much jumping forward and backwards, but no major issues.
First gameplay impressions: The AI is pretty fast. They smoked me at
75% strength the first few times I floundered around Bevan, slipping,
sliding and jumping sideways by not getting properly straightened for
the jumps.
There is plenty of fun bump-and-push action to be had here, very
reminsicent of the old Mickey Thompson stadium series.
It'd be nice to see the trucks shed fenders and parts like they did in
that now-defunct series, but it's not a major issue.
I'd actually like to see the AI act a little more fallible. If you
***up, they're basically gone, and aside from bumping together, I
never saw them do anything stupid like land on the barriers or flip.
Frame rates were lightning fast on my machine at 1024x768 with 16 bit
color. I upped the AI opponents to the max (15), and it still didn't
slow the game down at all. I guess thats the payoff for the simple
models and blurry textures. I think this game would perform well on
any 300mhz+ machine with a decent video card.
Miscellaneous. File this under goofy-but-annoying: the game has it's
own mouse pointer, but it left my regular mouse pointer disabled at
the center of the screen. It'd disappear a few seconds into a race.
I didn't get a chance to try the multiplayer, and couldn't find
anywhere to play online.
Overall: I'm still looking forward to purchasing the game as soon as I
see it. There is a lot of value here, especially for 20 bucks.
Should make a good spiritual successor to my beloved SODA until
someone buckes down and makes a full blown CORR sim
(http://www.racesimcentral.net/).
Tim