Sports Car GT (SCGT) reviewed at Digital Sportspage

Finally finished the review. http://www.digitalsports.com/dsports/pc2/sportscar/review.html Randy Randy Magruder http://members.home.com/rmagruder

Personally I think you give it too much credit. Even on Max settings at 1024x768 I still find the graphics blurry and wouldn't rate them as high. Track inaccuracies are annoying and so are fantasy tracks (although better done than Viper Racing). That and lack of telemetry, lack of lap time sheet during practice (whats the point!?), bad interface design (ok, who came up with the idea of having to assign BOTH a key and a joystick axis/button to a control?!?!), quirky AI that seems to have an unlimited fuel supply (mms..I run out of gas in a 15 minute race, they don't?! Um..yeah. Where is my damn fuel control so I can bumped down the mixture while I am way ahead of them), horrid multiplayer (6 people ONLY on a LAN? Give me a break.... this is no where as complex as GPL and it can handle at least 11 people [max I've had available to try it on a LAN ;)] in the LAN environment), etc. just dampen the game. Overlook those and its a fairly fun arcade racer, definitely I'd say the cream of the crop of arcade racers. I'd give it about a 70% rating.

Most of your criticisms are in my review. The only area we differ is in the points value of the problems, and that's only normal. Some people probably don't care as much about track accuracy as I do, for instance. Thanks, Randy

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>Personally I think you give it too much credit. Even on Max settings at >1024x768 I still find the graphics blurry and wouldn't rate them as high. >Track inaccuracies are annoying and so are fantasy tracks (although better >done than Viper Racing). That and lack of telemetry, lack of lap time sheet >during practice (whats the point!?), bad interface design (ok, who came up >with the idea of having to assign BOTH a key and a joystick axis/button to a >control?!?!), quirky AI that seems to have an unlimited fuel supply (mms..I >run out of gas in a 15 minute race, they don't?! Um..yeah. Where is my damn >fuel control so I can bumped down the mixture while I am way ahead of them), >horrid multiplayer (6 people ONLY on a LAN? Give me a break.... this is no >where as complex as GPL and it can handle at least 11 people [max I've had >available to try it on a LAN ;)] in the LAN environment), etc. just dampen >the game. Overlook those and its a fairly fun arcade racer, definitely I'd >say the cream of the crop of arcade racers. >I'd give it about a 70% rating. >> Finally finished the review. >> http://www.digitalsports.com/dsports/pc2/sportscar/review.html >> Randy >> Randy Magruder >> http://members.home.com/rmagruder

Randy Magruder http://members.home.com/rmagruder

The AI cars don't have unlimited fuel. They run low just like the human cars. As far as running out of gas in 15 minutes... you can change the fuel consumption and tire wear rate ( this way you can simulate a race with pit stops in less actual time). I like that feature. The controller setup problem is a one time nuisance. I really don't see why *** about it so much. I could care less about how many people on a lan race. I can rarely scare up one geeky friend to bring his pc over for LAN races. It the online racing that truly sucks. I also wish the tracks were more accurate. mike On Thu, 29 Apr 1999 08:56:03 -0500, "Chris Schletter"

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>Personally I think you give it too much credit. Even on Max settings at >1024x768 I still find the graphics blurry and wouldn't rate them as high. >Track inaccuracies are annoying and so are fantasy tracks (although better >done than Viper Racing). That and lack of telemetry, lack of lap time sheet >during practice (whats the point!?), bad interface design (ok, who came up >with the idea of having to assign BOTH a key and a joystick axis/button to a >control?!?!), quirky AI that seems to have an unlimited fuel supply (mms..I >run out of gas in a 15 minute race, they don't?! Um..yeah. Where is my damn >fuel control so I can bumped down the mixture while I am way ahead of them), >horrid multiplayer (6 people ONLY on a LAN? Give me a break.... this is no >where as complex as GPL and it can handle at least 11 people [max I've had >available to try it on a LAN ;)] in the LAN environment), etc. just dampen >the game. Overlook those and its a fairly fun arcade racer, definitely I'd >say the cream of the crop of arcade racers. >I'd give it about a 70% rating.

Are the tracks that far off? I've only seen them on T.V., and I was actually thinking they were pretty accurate. Regarding this in the review, I thought it was unfair of you to harp on track innaccuracies as such a major flaw, when the only one you knew for sure was innaccurate was Laguna Seca. It is a legitamite gripe, but "I've heard from others that other tracks are innaccurate" isn't exactly compelling evidence. Other than that, I felt you really nailed some of the problems with the game. Here's hoping ISI will keep up with the updates and address these. BTW, I was playing with 8 on a LAN the other day, with 8 AI cars filling out the field, and it ran without a hitch. The internet play does need BIG improvement, but the LAN play is some of the best racing I've ever had.

>Most of your criticisms are in my review. The only area we differ is >in the points value of the problems, and that's only normal. Some >people probably don't care as much about track accuracy as I do, for >instance. First, wanted to pass along kudos for one of the most thorough reviews I've seen. I must agree with your statement above. I think you did an excellent job of raising the issues. And yes, I do think there was a disconnect between your prose and your ratings, especially in the very high graphics score of 92. Given the relatively poor framerate (I have a c300a/450, Banshee, graphics on "high" not "max", and suffer the same chunkiness with mirror on that you experienced), the extreme popup, all with only 16 cars, the mediocre dash, poor e-mapping, the score strikes me as a mismatch. But again, for those who invest the time in reading the review, the points are there. It strikes me as if your text showed the dissapointment for what it could have been, but the scores were more forgiving. BTW, do these cars not have side mirrors? Guess I should check the video. The sound deserved a lower score (yes, this is a weighting issue). The big problem is the relative loudness of the opposition vs your car's interior sound. Couple that with the loud level of the cars behind (which I'm sure is what caused your lack of spatial awareness). At the start of a race, I *have* to be in the no-dash view so I can readily see if I'm redlining (since I can't hear it). These need to be addressed. And, like you, I often forsake the in-dash view. Which for us "***" simmers to accept, points to a problem with that view. I gather your review was without the advopts fix? I think at least one of the criticisms would be muted. If you are disappointed by the inconsistencies in the competitiveness as you state, and I do understand of what you write, perhaps the quick-race mode might better suit your needs? Spot-on agreement on how the AI is dumbed-down in one or two places on a track. This really does become a "beat the AI" trap. All in all, superb review. Dave

>Are the tracks that far off? I've only seen them on T.V., and I was actually >thinking they were pretty accurate. Regarding this in the review, I thought it >was unfair of you to harp on track innaccuracies as such a major flaw, when the >only one you knew for sure was innaccurate was Laguna Seca. It is a legitamite >gripe, but "I've heard from others that other tracks are innaccurate" isn't >exactly compelling evidence. The only thing was, I didn't name names, but I spoke to people I know well who have driven the real tracks, and trust their opinion. But man did they butcher Laguna... And as far as whether its a major flaw,. , from their "Product Description": "Racing occurs on authentic tracks from North America and Europe...Gamers can choose to race down the famouse corkscrew at Laguna Seca...Each of the tracks is accurately modeled to give players a highly realistic and immersive racing experience". Sorry, but this just nonsense and they shouldn't make such bold claims if someone who has been on the track can say with complete confidence that it is hogwash. If you don't believe me, you have only to go to the Laguna Seca web site and d/l the quicktime video and compare the Laguna Seca of this game with say, the Laguna Seca from EA's own SuperBike (also not perfect, but MUCH better and closer to the real thing). Thanks... Yeah, unfortunately for most of us Internet play is the only viable option :( Randy Randy Magruder http://members.home.com/rmagruder

>First, wanted to pass along kudos for one of the most thorough reviews I've >seen. Thanks :) I rated the graphics as high as I did because I think when everything is turned on they are very detailed and very pretty. I think the pop-up issue is a bigger issue than the dashboard, for instance, because pop-up directly affects your driving. And as computers get faster, more and more people will be able to crank up the graphics. Rating a game's graphics is ALWAYS difficult because unlike a Playstation game, you can't apply one rating to everyone. A game which might be a complete dog on a P233 with a Voodoo 1 might be beautiful and glorious on a Pentium III 500 with dual Voodoo 2's! So who is right? I think probably my machine is slightly below average for *** gamers (a P300 with a Voodoo 2). I think the median these days is between a 333 and 350, whereas 2 months ago my machine was probably the median -- doggone moving target technology! No. just the big rear view mirror in the middle. I can't hear redlining whether there are other cars around me or not. I have to use the tach for that. That's right. I review the game as it was shipped by the manufacturer, otherwise these companies would get away with *** thanks to the hacks of dedicated simmers :) I did test some quick race stuff, but I still felt that the career mode is the "meat" of the game and deserved most of the attention. Thanks. I welcome disagreement with my numbers, but hopefully the text will help people decide what they do and don't care about and whether the game warrants their money. I really try to downplay the ratings as it is so hard to quantify things numerically in such a broad sense. Randy Randy Magruder http://members.home.com/rmagruder

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> I rated the graphics as high as I did because I think when everything > is turned on they are very detailed and very pretty. I think the > pop-up issue is a bigger issue than the dashboard, for instance, > because pop-up directly affects your driving. And as computers get > faster, more and more people will be able to crank up the graphics. > Rating a game's graphics is ALWAYS difficult because unlike a > Playstation game, you can't apply one rating to everyone. A game > which might be a complete dog on a P233 with a Voodoo 1 might be > beautiful and glorious on a Pentium III 500 with dual Voodoo 2's! So > who is right?

I have often thought that this was an area that needed improving in games reviews these days. There are so many variables for the review hardware and so many selectable options in the software a review "score" can often give no indication of what the game is going to be like on your own set up. Maybe it would be constructive to do a review across several different specs of machine ? That way you could find something close to your own for comparison. Maybe the speed/quality could be factored in to the overall result ? Maybe a single score is not adequate to guage something as variable across machines as graphics ? However, there is no substitute for a decent piece of prose that describes the reality - so thank you for being so thorough in your reviews; because of the above problem I have never taken a single score as being a useable guide. John

What settings did you use to get good LAN play, I just tried it on a 2 player LAN setup (Win98 peer to peer 10baseT hookup) and the warp when the cars got close was awful. Also the cars would not touch but actually drove right through one another like you were racing a ghost car. This was on IPX with the data rate slider tried at min/mid/max. Max setting eliminated the warping when there was some distance between the 2 cars but was wild when one car was overtaking the other. In the comparisons to GPL, I believe SCGT cars experience tire wear and brake fade, or so it seems to me. Neither of which seem to be noticed in GPL. RAH

One of the best things about a new sim release is reading your review, Randy. Thanks, Paul

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> Finally finished the review. > http://www.digitalsports.com/dsports/pc2/sportscar/review.html > Randy > Randy Magruder > http://members.home.com/rmagruder

btw, Randy, are you going to be reviewing TOCA2? Cheers, Paul

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> One of the best things about a new sim release is reading your review, > Randy. > Thanks, > Paul > > Finally finished the review. > > http://www.digitalsports.com/dsports/pc2/sportscar/review.html > > Randy > > Randy Magruder > > http://members.home.com/rmagruder