YouGamers.com

Reviews

Sega Rally

Tear Up The Track - Virtually, Of Course

As with past Sega Rally titles, different terrain types offer different levels of grip. New in Sega Rally (Revo) is dynamic course alteration, in the form of lines cut by tires in the mud, dirt and snow. Sega coined this system "Geo-Deformation" (Geo-Mod having been taken by the shooter title Red Faction). Silly trademarking aside, the terrain degradation plays a key role in the racing. With an Xbox 360 Controller for Windows (the ideal peripheral for the game), Force Feedback effects bring courses to life. What was the fast inside line on the first lap may be the slowest line on the final lap due to worn-away track surface, and the resulting controller vibrations range from subtle to jarring. You can feel when the wheels pop in and out of deep ruts, and since AI cars are prone to take the same line each lap, it's often a wise decision to not follow too closely. Geo-Deformation escaped the realm of gimmickry and is a sure-fire enhancement. No doubt other developers will take notice and implement similar dynamic track features in their racing games.

A Quick Race mode offers one-off races with a variety of cars and tracks, but the meat of the game, lean as it may be, rests in the Championship mode. This is a walk through four tiers - Amateur, Professional, Expert and Final - in which you earn new cars and paint jobs while simultaneously earning points. Creating a profile is necessary to save progress and track points, which are used to determine when tiers and difficulties are unlocked. Unlike a real rally, in which stages are hosted in the same locale, a three-stage Sega rally includes three-lap races in different environments. Races must be completed in groups, so leaving after two of three races forfeits any points earned (races are short, though a save-anywhere feature would have been welcome). Qualifying is non-existent, so you'll always start from in the back of the pack and have to work through traffic for a placing. Hey, at least you're not pumping quarters into an arcade cabinet, right?

Cars get dirtied-up as a race progresses, but there's neither visible nor functional car damage is present.

A contrast in environments: from the tropics to the arctic.

The learning curve is gentle if a bit awkward, and the racing is addictive. Gameplay is a fine balance between challenging and rewarding, with just enough incentive to keep pushing forward to the next round. It's not all roses, however. Technically, the game still feels like a console port: a standalone configuration program is used for graphics and controller configuration, requiring a full restart to change audio or visual settings. The mouse can't be used to navigate in-game menus, and controller configuration is effectively limited to either the keyboard or an Xbox 360 controller with Windows drivers. A Logitech gamepad refused to play nicely with the game: no combination of configuration programs would properly map the gamepad's triggers to the gas and brake. Even Microsoft's own Xbox 360 Wireless Racing Wheel was incompatible with the game, though this could be attributed to immature drivers for the wheel as much as the game code itself (other wheels, such as Logitech's G25, do work with the game, but it's a better experience with a gamepad - Ed).

Rally racing is dirty, and the flying mud in wet sections highlights that point well...

Alpine courses have changes in elevation and are rife with tight corners.

Multiplayer: The Sound Of Silence

After breezing through the short single-player options, you may be tempted to give multiplayer a shot. As expected, it's difficult to find willing challengers (cross-platform play between consoles and PCs isn't supported). And even with a low-ping connection to the host, online racing suffers from a strange case of intermittent updating. One moment, a car is on the left-hand side of the track, and the next time a frame is rendered, the same car is on the right. These synchronization issues, combined with a general tendency for pinball-alley style full-contact racing, will almost surely leave a sour taste in your mouth. The time attack mode is just as boring as it sounds; it's great to have a worldwide fastest time, but when the list of contenders is so short, there's no pride to be had in reaching the top.

Page 1: IntroductionPage 2: GameplayPage 3: Gameplay ContinuedPage 4: Performance and HardwarePage 5: Conclusion and Scores

Related Stuff

Tags