Ridge Racer Revolution original 1995 review
Here are two original reviews of Ridge Racer Revolution from 1995!
The reviews clearly show how amazing this game was compared to the state of the art.
Review 1
Just got Ridge Racer Revolution.
- Its faster and smoother (but still not as smooth as wipeout)
- No slowdown at any point, (unlike RR as you approach the bridge)
- Only one place with visible popup, and its minor
- Hitting cars and the wall doesnt wash off as much speed as RR
- It seems easier than RR, or maybe I got used to Negcon on wipeout
- You start with 4 car choices
- The whole track still fits in memory, but there is more detail
- There are many more announcer snippets, eg, come up behind a car or group of cars, and he will say "Target locked...", and he will tease you if you fail to catch someone, reward you for fast passing.
- The game initially offers only one track, but in short, medium and long forms.
- Beat the three track variations and you get them mirrored - six "tracks"
- The two-player track looks different (cant check that though)
- The black car and the cooler white car is there to be beat
- each car comes in three, and later four, speed versions, this is actually more a speed control on the game since opponents also move faster if you choose a high speed car variation.
- The girl with the signboard wears differently coloured high cut bikinis
- the tracks have more tunnels and walls, this probably helps reduce popup
- the beach-side has 100s of 3d palm trees, which look great
- the water is a lovely azure blue, the track goes over the water.
- there is a helicopter, a 747 and a smaller plane (?)
- game loading delay is minimal to nonexistent
- the 3d track maps can be rotated and spun
- the music CD swap trick works as long as you dont change courses
- the title page spotlight can be shifted around
- there are more music tracks on the CD (12 or so?) some are good, but most are amsterdam style hard-techno which is a little edgy. The Wipeout tracks are much much better.
- supports link-up
Summary: Improved in almost every area. just a little too easy? Linkup would be insanely fun.
--
Justin.
Review 2
Hi to you RR fans.
For once let people from France express themselves :-)
I just played Revolution last week-end (12/10/95 :-) )
It's an amazing game. Everything is perfect ! Beautiful ! Smooth !
First, the intro.
You don't have any fancy intro a la Tekken or WipeOut (wow !), but instead you get to play a new version of Galaxians (2000 something). BTW it's much more difficult than the old one. Needless to say that I didn't get the extra cars nor did I find someone with them on a memory card :-(
Then the menus:
They are much more beautiful and the car you chose appears full screen then if you choose it, it zooms out to fit in a small window in the menu. It's quite a nice effect.
The circuits:
They are different and much longer (you even have the length in meters).
BUT the main (small)drawback is that it's the same philosophy as in the previous game. You start from one circuit and the other ones are variations from the same. They are wonderful, no glitches, the noise you make when you bump into the landscape is different. BTW, you can even bump in cars from the side (and not only from the rear or front).
The rearview mirror is very useful (especially against the yellow car).
I didn't finish to get to play against the black one :-(
You can even see a sun ray go through your windshield when you drive by the beach in the daylight. And it's much more difficult to drive in the night..
Well I think that's all for the moment.
I could easily write about it for hours, the details are so realistic.....
For those who can, you MUST buy it NOW !
Allez, au revoir
--
Farid SALAH Institut Francais du Petrole (DIMA-DER)
4, Avenue de Bois Preau 92506 Rueil Malmaison Cedex France
e-mail: farid.salah@ifp.fr, farid@geomath.fr
