MRC: Multi-Racing Championship

It's a tough call, but if you wanted to compare Multi Racing Championship to a realistic racing event, it would most likely fit into the traditional European rally cross. Comparatively, the game looks similar to Sega Rally (right down to the flashing yellow roadsigns that appear when nearing turns). It, however, doesn't really play like Sega's signature racing game.

There hasn't been a revolutionary racing sim (or even many racers at all) made for the N64 yet. Most of the N64 racers I've tried sport unparalleled smoothness along with a limited amount of pop-up. MRC is the exception, not only for its smooth animation and frame rate, but in overall gameplay as well. There are no skips or slowdown when things get crowded on the screen (although you almost never see more than four cars at once). You also won't see the track generating itself just inches in front of your car, as is the case with many racing games on the market. MRC does its best to take advantage of the N64's processing power to give you a smooth and fast-paced racing experience formally found only in the arcades.

Aesthetical questions answered, MRC follows a standard format when it comes to track selection, skill level, the amount of tracks as well as the win-reward system of car acquirement and modification. Basically, there are three very long courses all with several shortcuts and alternate routes hidden within (they may be toggled off as well). It's up to you to find out which of the alternate paths will aid you in producing the best times as you make your way to the finish line. This is a relatively new and welcome feature in racing games and it goes a long way in boosting the complexity and replay value of MRC.

Because the tracks are so long, roadways with variable conditions will be encountered in each. Dirt. mud. asphalt and even cobblestone are a sampling of some of the surfaces drivers will have to endure. These different terrain types make car modification especially important when tackling these terrains.

Most of the cars resemble the classic hatchback rally racer while others are a bit more interesting such as pick-up trucks and other similar vehicles. Unfortunately, there are no brand-name licenses to give this racing simulation a more realistic edge.

Each of the six cars (along with two hidden ones) boasts its own handling characteristics in addition to front, rear and four-wheel drive configurations. The unique handling becomes especially evident when cornering on the dirt or gravel roads. Some of the vehicles are more prone to fish-tailing and powerslides which, in the end, can prove quite bad for your final time. To remedy this, a number of options will let you fine-tune each vehicle's suspension, tires, gearbox, steering and more in your quest to create the best car for the course. In the end. your driving, (not just your car tweaking) will change the outcome.

Other options include the ability to view a 3-D model of each track (much like Rage Racer) complete with bad weather indicators denoting the affected portions of the track.

Another important feature concerning the game's replay value is the ability to race in Mirror Mode, effectively bringing the total number of tracks to six. And, of course, the requisite two-player split-screen racing is also present in the game.

As their release dates draw near, it looks like it could be a neck-and-neck battle between Multi Racing Championship and Kemco's Top Gear Rally for the N64 racing crown. Both games share many of the same attributes and styles; it's just a matter of whose racer edges out the other.

To find out the winner, look for a comprehensive review of both of these N64 racing games in the upcoming months of Team EGM.

MARIO KART 64 AND WAVE RACE both showed that the N64 is more than capable of handling highly playable racing games, but until now the big question for petrolheads has been unanswered – will it have a 'realistic' racer capable of competing with Rage Racer or Sega Rally? Seta's Rev Limit and Kemco's Top Gear Rally are both waiting for the warm-up lap, but the first to leave the grid is Imagineer's Multi Racing Championship, henceforth known by the ink-saving acronym of MRC.

When you start playing, a total of eight cars are available, two extra motors becoming ripe for the thrashing once you've beaten the CPU-controlled Match Race drivers. Of the basic models, four are straight rally cars in a mixture of two- and four-wheel drive, while the others are a motley assortment of off-roaders. The former quartet are faster and ideally suited to flat-out tarmac bashing, while the latter, unsurprisingly, are in their element when plugging through mud or bouncing across snowdrifts. Since all the tracks feature a mix of conditions, use of the customisation screen to adjust each car's roadholding, suspension and aerodynamics is essential to tune them to your needs. Quite how a pickup truck, a vehicle once famously described by PJ O'Rourke as 'a front porch on wheels', can be made more aerodynamic without the aid of a lump hammer and an orbital sander is a mystery, but never mind; whack the slider as far over as it'll go and you can eke an extra 15kph from your ride.

Each car handles differently, depending on its size and which of its wheels are used to put the power through the rubber. The little Renault-alike hatchback is very manoeuvrable, but its light weight means it slips about like Torville and Dean on a slick of Bob Monkhouse's Brylcream if the wheel's hoiked about too sharply off-road. Conversely, the Humvee clone crashes over rough terrain without a care, but once on the road just can't keep pace with the road cars, requiring downright aggressive driving to stop people overtaking.

There are three tracks, with mirror versions accessible once the computer-controlled racers (Hannya, a demonic git in a McLaren F1 knock-off and leather clad babe Deus in her dune buggy) have been trounced. This doesn't sound like many, but the 'multi' part of the game's title comes from the alternate routes through each course. Sticking to paved roads is the most trouble-free form of motoring, but true racers will duck onto the off-road shortcuts, which if negotiated successfully can shave upwards of ten seconds off the lap time. Mess up, however, and you'll skid like a condemned man's y-fronts and end well out of the running.

Another tweak that adds variety to MRC is the addition of changeable weather conditions, snow, rain and fog sometimes wafting across the higher parts of the tracks. The weather doesn't make much of a difference to the racing, but it's a nice atmospheric touch.

Vroom 101

So how do things fare when you try to put the pedal to the metal, or rather, the thumb to the, erm, mushroom-shaped thing? The cars are controlled using the analogue stick, which makes a real difference from the edgy tap-tap-hold D-pad steering on other machines. All that's missing now is an analogue button for proper accelerator/brake control... With a bit of practice, impressive powerslides over gravel and dirt surfaces can be accomplished, and although it's of no use whatsoever in actually winning races, a reasonable imitation of a handbrake turn is even possible.

After Mario Kart, though, this degree of control is what we've come to expect from an N64 game – what counts are the nuances, and this is where MRC starts to stall. No matter how much you customise them, some of the cars just aren't competitive (the ultra-skiddy Verno is probably the worst), while a worryingly short amount of practice will guarantee victory every time with others (such as Kingroader – see King of the Road boxout).

What's also disappointing about the cars is the lack of collision damage, or even crashes. MRC is more of an arcade game than a simulation, so obviously having your car wiped out before getting round the first corner would be somewhat frustrating, but even if you plough head-on into a rock wall at full speed, the worst that happens is that you bounce back a few feet and come to a stop. Drive onto an embankment and you might reasonably expect to have your car flipped onto its roof, requiring the help of the trackside spectators to right you, but instead your wheels are sucked squarely back onto terra firma in the total opposite of buttered toast syndrome. Even the waste of good silicon that was Cruis'n USA flipped cars around like cards shuffled bronco-fashion, but the most MRC has to offer are feeble bunny-hops and the occasional moment of Dukes Of Hazzard two-wheel driving.

The opposition provided by MRC doesn't really present much of a challenge either. In championship mode, you start at the back of a field of ten cars and obviously have to fight your way to the head of the pack. Unfortunately, the race leader doesn't use any kind of skill to fight you off – the only reason he's at the front is because the programmers took the cheap option and gave him a 30 second start. Occasionally a car will weave in front of you in an attempt to block any overtaking on your part, but that should hold you up for, oh, all of two seconds. The other drivers might as well be in the slots of a Scalextric track for all the tactical nous they display.

Hannya and Deus, the two hidden Match Race drivers, show a bit more intelligence, since they actively try to obstruct you if you get too close, and nudge you into walls once you pass. Beat Hannya on all three tracks and you get to fight Deus; defeat her and the mirror tracks become available. This should take you no more than an afternoon, unfortunately – less if you use Kingroader as your car in the challenge. Once you've memorised the fastest route around each track, you can win every time, because the enemy vehicles always follow the same course – all you need to do is block them.

Split Screams

The two-player mode ought to deal with these problems, as anyone capable of holding a Nintendo pad should be able to outwit the computer opponents. Hell, fungi could outwit the computer opponents. The bad news is that after getting used to the fairly expansive scenery in one-player mode, the atom-sized split screens are a nasty shock. Even with the tiny screens, reduced detail and lack of other road users, it all gets a bit herky-jerky at times. Playing against a friend can be fun for a while, but the limited number of tracks quickly pall and edgy sideways glances in the direction of Mario Kart distract somewhat from the not especially thrilling action on screen.

This is a major problem with MRC – it's just not exciting enough. The feeling of speed is closer to a trip round the ring road than a 200mph thrash through the country! The cockpit view is slightly faster than either of the two external chase views, presumably because the machine doesn't have to worry about drawing your car, but it doesn't bode too well for the other two impending rally games if this is the best the N64 can manage. The key to getting the adrenaline flowing in any racing game is speed, but MRC is a little bit too languid.

MRC also blows a gasket on its presentation at times. The positioning of the on-screen displays is badly thought out, whether you're viewing the car from behind or using the cockpit view – the huge lap time readouts frequently obscure tight right-hand corners in the one-player mode, and when two players are battling it out against each other, the equally chunky position indicators do much the same on left-handers. This gets particularly annoying in the night races against the computer challengers, as the scenery is hard enough to pick out through the gloom without having a load of irrelevant numbers slapped over it.

Some sections of track look almost real, like the run through a snow-filled gully on the mountain track, but there are other sections which are just boring stretches of grey road and brown cliff walls, looking more like the three-year old Ridge Racer on PlayStation than a brand-new N64 game. Cute roadside touches like leaping dolphins, the inevitable hot air balloons and what looks like a statue of Lenin occasionally perk things up, but it's hard escape the feeling of being walled in by the scenery.

The variable weather and changing lighting conditions help add spice, but not enough, and MRC's representation of night driving is a joke. Unlike the PlayStation's V-Rally, which simulates banks of powerful full-beam KC Daylighters so well that you can almost see the startled rabbits becoming roadkill, MRC just darkens all the colours and superimposes a pathetic glow effect over your car's headlights. The effect is not unlike the way that 1960s war films put blue film over the camera lens to make us think that the glaring mid-day sun was actually moonlight, and it's about as convincing.

Sonically, MRC is a let-down, as the engine notes of the cars were variously described by office passers-by as sounding like "distant jetskis", "hairdryers" or "weed whackers" rather than throbbing V8s and high-performance alloy specials. There's the inevitable annoying commentator, but the lack of memory in the cart makes him even more infuriating than usual, spewing out the same few moronic phrases three or four times a lap. "Don't give up now, go on, pass them all!" is his favourite advice – no shit, Sherlock! And here I was planning on hanging around in 10th place for the whole game. MRC is the same size as Starfox (96Mbits), with a hell of a lot less variety in the scenery and gameplay – surely a larger vocabulary than that of a retarded parrot could have been squeezed in?

Ultimately, MRC is an okay game, but nothing more, failing to drag itself out of the 'average' bracket in any area. Its easiness is a major kick to lasting challenge (unless endlessly making minuscule adjustments to your route in Time Trial mode for those tenth-of-a-second-savings is what turns you on), because unlike Rage Racer or Sega Rally, in only a day or so you'll have seen absolutely everything the game has to offer. And there's not much there.

From the shores of Ocean comes their latest title for one or two players called Multi Racing Championship. MRC features a selection of eight vehicles and the chance to push those vehicles to their limit on three distinctly different tracks. In-game options include player-specified engine and braking options as well as handling and acceleration options. Road courses have the player racing through various types of scenery, also.

These vary from seaside and mountainous tracks to the heart of downtown for a constantly changing thrill. This forces players to custom tune their cars' performances to make the best of any situation. There are also on- and off-road "junction boxes" where the player is given the option to select different paths that may be faster or hinder their winning chances by forcing them into places their cars are not equipped to go. With features like these, MRC will be a title to look for.

A ponderous and unexciting attempt to bring rallycross to the N64. MRC is lacking in speed (generally considered to be a major ingredient in a racing game) and takes a good kicking on the difficulty front by being way too easy. The limited number of tracks (a mere three, not counting the usual mirror options) gives it the lifespan of a gnat. One of the cars is unbeatable, as well - why?

Sluggish and unexciting racing game that is far too easy and has only a feeble three tracks. There are much better racers around.

The conversion job had done it no favours. 'Gritty' graphics and, in comparison with Top Gear Rally, it's also far too easy.

Its goofy name aside, Multi Racing Championship is M good news for N64 race fans as it finally provides an alternative to Cruis'n USA. This arcade-style racer suffers from some shortcomings, but delivers enough white-knuckle action to merit a lengthy look.

Starting off with the bad news, MRC offers a meager three courses, which drastically limits the game's replay value. But the good news is that they're cool tracks filled with on-road and off-road action. Each one branches off three or four times, sending you burrowing through underground tunnels and skidding across icy fields. The fun comes from sorting out the right path and car setup, then slamming your opponents out of the way as you blaze toward the finish. An excellent two-player splitscreen mode provides the finishing touch.

With a little more polish and depth, MRC would've redlined your engines. As it stands, it ranks as an excellent rental for most and a good buy for racing fiends.

Graphics

Nothing about MRG's workmanlike visuals will generate much excitement, but they keep you moving with good game speed and minimal pop-up. Solid, well-varied tracks and some slick cars complete the package.

Sound

MRC's sound finishes in the middle of the pack with forgettable tunes and an announcer who's just plain stupid. The engine noises, shrieking tires, and other in-car effects pass inspection, but won't impress you.

Control

Arcade racers will appreciate the smooth Ridge Racer feel of MRC's controls, which don't challenge you with sim-style technicalities. The analog stick handles like a dream, nicely displaying each car's unique traits.

Fun Factor

MRC joins Wave Race and Mario Kart as the N64's only solid racing games, delivering fun, competitive action. But with only three tracks to choose from, drivers will quickly run out of things to do, other than bumping fenders in the awesome two-player mode.