The weakest in the Road Rash series for Playstation
Written: Mar 01 '02 (Updated Mar 02 '02)
Product Rating:
Pros: Essential for fans of the Road Rash series
Cons: Where's the fighting?
The Bottom Line: Great for fans of the Road Rash series, but look elsewhere if you can only buy one of the three titles in that series made for Playstation.
HawgWyld's Full Review: Road Rash 3D for PlayStation 1
For my money, the Road Rash series is one of the best things designed by Electronic Arts or, indeed, any other company. The games in that series are fun as all get out, and emphasize lots of motorcycle racing and fighting.
Well, Road Rash 3D doesn't really emphasize fighting all that much. In fact, fans looking forward to a lot of kicking and punching in this title will likely be let down. In other Road Rash titles, combatants will typically keep up with each other when they get into a brawl. That's not the case in Road Rash 3D as motorcycles zip right by, barely giving the player a chance to get in a couple of good shots.
While that might be more realistic than the other titles (as if any of this stuff is realistic -- if you hit the side of a building a 100 M.P.H., you'll die, but not in Road Rash!), it sure takes a lot away from the fun of the title. Ultimately, this is a fun motorcycle racing game that downplays the fighting more than ever before. While this title would likely receive rave reviews and sell for around $500 on eBay if it were made for the Atari Jaguar, Playstation owners have been spoiled by better games. Indeed, both Road Rash and Road Rash: Jailbreak for the Playstation are better games than this one.
Still, this is fun, and I enjoy it. That, however, is probably because I love the Road Rash series and am familiar enough with it to appreciate the titles for it (yep, I'm building up the Road Rash titles for Genesis and Playstation).
As for the graphics, I'm not sure if the they are truly three-dimensional under the most common definitions. When a game is billed as being "3D" I think of tons of polygons. Primarily, the riders and everything else seem to be represented by scaling sprites. While I'm not an expert in that area, I'd suggest this is more of a "simulated 3D" game than one featuring a ton of textured polygons.
That, however, is a small complaint. The graphics look cartoonish, but that's to be expected as this is an early Playstation game. Sadly, this game conveys the sense of motion a little bit too well. The graphics tend to be blurry at high speeds, thus making it easy for the player to lose track of what's going on in the very busy roadway. Still, once the player adjusts, the blurry graphics are manageable.
As for control, the Dual Shock controller is a must for this title as the analog sticks are silky smooth on this. Since the frame rate is good and zippy, control is precise and not ruined by lagging graphics and such. It's too bad the game doesn't use the "vibration" feature of the Dual Shock as that would only enhance the gameplay. Still, the controls are great.
Better yet, the bikes handle fairly well. Essentially, there are four classes of bikes to choose from -- cruisers, racing bikes, sporting bikes and rats. Each has it's own handling characteristics (cruisers, for example, don't corner as well as rats, but have a higher top speed and lower acceleration rate). Also, the player is representing in accordance with the bike he's chosen -- chains and leather for a cruiser, sporty racing leathers for sporting bikes and etc. Choosing the various bikes does have quite an impact on the game because of the different characteristics of the motorcycles. That adds a nice dimension to the game.
For those unfamiliar with Road Rash, this game requires the player to start out with a small amount of money, buy a motorcycle, win cash for races and upgrade bikes. Also, the player will advance to higher levels upon finishing at least third in all the courses on a level. Higher levels, of course, bring longer courses, more difficult conditions (more traffic and such), faster riders and etc.
Historically, Road Rash titles encourage the player to fight, avoid hitting cars, run over pedestrians, avoid getting caught by the cops and raise a bunch of hell while trying to win races. All of those elements are here, even though the fighting is downplayed to a shameful degree.
As for sound, it's not real good on this title. You get the usual assortment of rockin' bands (Kid Rock and etc.), but everything sounds tinny. The music, sound effects and everything else comes across with no bass. That bothers me quite a bit, but not too much to keep from enjoying this title.
And, forget about multiplayer on this. This is a single player game. Honestly, if you want a good Playstation Road Rash title for two players, buy Road Rash: Jailbreak as the split-screen, two-player mode is fantastic.
Another complaint I have about this game is collision detection. It's really quite odd, indeed. While the detection is pretty consistent when the player happens to hit another motorcycle, car or pedestrian, it's absolutely hit and miss for objects on the side of the road. Take a telephone pole, for example. If the player happens to hit that pole, he may go right through it or wind up wrecking his motorcycle. You never know when the horrible collision detection is going to impact the game, and that annoys me.
While I enjoy this title, this one won't attract many fans to the Road Rash series. There's not enough fighting in it and the sound is thin. Stick with either Road Rash or Road Rash: Jailbreak if you only want to buy one of these. Road Rash: Jailbreak features lots of polygons, good bass and fantastic control, while the original is just a classic game of racing and fighting. All three, of course, are games one can just pick up and have fun with immediately.
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