Old School - Daytona USA

[JohnBM01]

GTPlanet, as Ridge Racer was coming along pretty well, Sega released an arcade racer to perhaps challenge Ridge Racer. Whereas Ridge Racer had... I don't know, 30 frames per second, Daytona USA had about 60 frames per second. This was around 1994. Three-dimensional graphics were getting much better and even much faster. I believe this is also one of the first games or racing games to utilize 3D Acceleration (or was it the San Francisco Rush series which utilized the still-pretty 3DFX graphics engine?). One of the biggest pluses for the game is that four twin or eight single units can be linked together for 8-player racing action. Yeah, I know I'm not the "multiplayer is primary" person, but you have to admit. It's fun to race against seven others. Have to have a lot of arcade room space, though. And this may have been the first arcade game to have more than 3 or 4 players (remember Ivan Stewart's Off-Road Challenge?").

PROS: fast racing; competitive action; good music; as many as 40 to a track; nice control

CONS: some shaky controls sometimes; few tracks; get it wrong, and you get that "signature" spin in the air, do a 360, and land on all fours crash; pit - race over; three modes: Normal, Grand Prix, and Endurance

VERDICT: Still a great racing game even if you don't like "stock" cars.

Regardless, I'm kind of wanting to review old racing games in case you may have not played or seen them before. You know, appreciate racing games before and even after Gran Turismo. Having said that, there you have it.

 

[code_kev]

John. I love Daytona USA.

The first time I played it in the arcades, I was blown away but its incredible (for the time) graphics, I mean hell, I was used to crap like virtua racing XD.
OFC I got it on the saturn, and while the conversion suffered, it still captured that feeling the arcade game had.

good music

DUH DUH DUH DUH DUHD UHD UHDDDDUHHHHHHH duhhhhhhhh

DAYTONNNAAAAAAAA lets go away...lets go away


*can't actually remember the words to the dodgy euro rock sound track*

 

[Cap'n Jack]

I love the Daytona and Daytona 2 arcade games. Me and my friends have great close racing on them!

 

[Cosmic]

The first time I played it in the arcades, I was blown away but its incredible (for the time) graphics, I mean hell, I was used to crap like virtua racing XD.

Oh , the arcades I blow away about 20$ just for Daytona on my birthday in Hungary I didn't win once, but it was just so funny that I could sit there for ages

 

[spooony]

I spent quite a lot of time playing Daytona 2 at the arcades back in the day I played the Advanced track more than all the others though...

 

[Ikari]

Last I remember, the Gameworks here in LV still has the 8 player motion setup.
I know the Luxor arcade still has the 8 player Virtual Racing.

 

[code_kev]

Ahhhhh memories XD

 

[JohnBM01]

Wow, history in the making! First post in a while where I'm not blasted on for some reason. I have the PC Version, and you can get about six new rides. You have the regular machines, then you have 2 others to start with, then six more to unlock. I was able to unlock all of them. Funny enough, if you clear the Expert Stage at the top, you get to race a horse! Just for fun, I take it around the three tracks. Can you imagine a horse running at about 200 mph against 39 other cars at the oval track? Unless that horse is a popular American car named after a horse, of course.

In case you haven't heard of it, let me describe the three tracks.

The BEGINNER course is a stock car staple, the oval course. This one is pretty nice, but the only thing you need to be concerned with is the final turn to this tri-oval. I heard Sting did the BGM for the oval. The ADVANCED course takes you around what seems to be a sort of natural park with only two real challenging corners. Other than that, it's a nice track through this rollercoaster ride. The EXPERT course is a challenging street course going from the bridge to the airport, the suburbs, back on the bridge, a launch pad for a space shuttle, and the toughest turn in the game, a super-tight hairpin with lots of runoff road.

I think I've actually seen four Twin units linked together for Daytona action. I actually raced on that collection of Twin Cabinets. Not against seven others, but surely would have been fun. I think Sega's really made multiplayer racing more fun by racing against 8 others. It would be GREAT if you had a party at an arcade place, and you invited seven cool people. I normally don't say this, but it's more fun with more linked units. I have a Daytona USA 2 review in a later post, plus another Sega arcade review.