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DEVELOPER
Imagineer/Genki
PUBLISHER
Ocean
AVAILABLE
Now
MEDIUM
Cartridge
PLAYERS
Four
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 et me tell you about the first time I booted up MRC. As soon as I pressed
power, the obligatory "you don't have enough memory" message
appeared. Ok, I thought, no problem, I'll just fix that in the memory manager.
So I hit start, but nothing happened. I tried all the other buttons, still
nothing. Then I read the screen a little more closely, what's this? I have
to take the controller pak out and restart the game? No memory manager?
This wouldn't be a problem had I not just sold both my N64 games for a
copy of Final Fantasy 7, but I digress.
MRC is the latest racing game to be released on the N64. Comprised of
five courses, each with both on and off road areas, and a choice of twelve
cars, variety is the name of the game. Available are season mode, match
play, time trial, free run and two-player mode. Two cars and tracks must
be unlocked, as well.
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While the graphics are nice, the control leaves much
to be desired.
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To coin a phrase, Rubbin's Racin'. Any stock car fan worth his salt
will tell you it was a racing truism long before Robert Duvall uttered
the words in Days of Thunder. Unfortunately, the developers of this title,
along with many other racing games, it seems, never heard of it. In MRC,
as is all too often the case, touching another player or the wall will
result in a dramatic loss of speed. In my opinion, if you're going to have
a full bodied racing game, you need to take into account that minor contact
will occur from time to time, that's the point of having the wheels protected.
But, again, I've wandered…
The control in MRC seems to be a little off. While you can set up the
car by adjusting anything from the rubber, to the gearing, to the angle
of the spoiler, it just doesn't seem to help. In order to make the vehicles
handle smoothly; you have to make them so slow that they're not competitive.
In order to give them a high top speed, the handling suffers so much it's
like driving on a sheet of ice. I tried for days to find a happy medium,
but I've yet to achieve it. On the upside, I did notice that the off road
vehicles have a decided advantage when in their element, which is a nice
touch.
The graphics are pretty standard fare for an N64 game. The fog is present
only when the weather conditions require it. Dynamic weather and day to
night racing is always a good thing, and MRC pulls it off pretty well.
The track textures are clean, and the framerate is very smooth. The car
design is excellent, although the paintjobs are a little too fuzzy for
my tastes.
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Witness the lone vehicle that seems to handle somewhat
like it should.
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The sound, on the other hand, borders on irritating. The engine noise
is your basic, short sample played over and over again, to the point of
insanity. The announcer is also horrible; forcing himself to sound excited.
In the end, MRC manages to be average at best. For the racing starved
N64 crowd, this may be enough, but don't count on it. To it's credit, this
title offers a lot of diversity and nice graphics, if you can get around
the control. My advice? Wait for F1 Pole Position 64.
-- Greg Sewart
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