Top Gear Rally 2

If there were one word to describe this game as a whole, 'average' would be it. There are some bits of the game which really do shine out, but on the other hand, there are times when the game screams out for help. One thing which is very noticeable is the fact that the game has included a two-player tournament, but has neglected to offer either Arcade or Time Trial modes.

Perhaps the strangest thing about TGR 2 is the fact that the game, like its predecessor, doesn't include any officially licensed cars. The whole idea behind any rally game is that it focuses on the cars themselves and the competition between the manufacturers as well as the drivers. This absence of favourites such as the Subaru is even more noticeable in the sequel, because all of the cars are spitting images of real-life vehicles. Odder still, buried in the game on billboards are logos of Toyota and Subaru – so were the official licenses removed at the last minute?

Start Your Engines

Either way, you get some good looking cars to race with. It's just the same as playing an unofficial F1 game – just imagine they're there. Besides, it's much more fun to see the sillier names. Who wouldn't swap their Ford Focus for an Argon Focal? The cars themselves look quite impressive and shiny, which is a shame because they stand out a bit too much in the dull surroundings. Even when you are racing through blazing hot deserts with sunset backgrounds, the environment feels more depressing than an episode of EastEnders. This isn't to say that the graphics aren't good, because minor fogging aside they are – it's just that the scenery is bland and uninspiring.

At its worst, the scenery often repeats itself (even on the non-random tracks) and when racing along some trails you'd be forgiven for thinking that you were on a circuit. The worst culprit for this is the repeating town square, which on one track crops up three times!

The graphical effects, on the other hand, do spruce up the appearance of the game quite a bit. Like a true rally game, you now get water, dust and mud sprays galore as you powerslide round the corners and through the rougher sections of track.

Tear Up The Track

The water, and the mud in particular, looks really good because as it flicks up off your wheels you get splats on the screen. This doesn't quite have the same effect if you aren't playing with in-car view switched on but it still looks smart. To top it all, you also get cracks in your windscreen and what can only be bird droppings as well! Fortunately, all of this does clear off throughout the race so you can see where you're heading. Yes, these rally cars have new technology that heals the very cracks in your windscreen!

Something really disappointing about TGR 2 is the fact that car damage doesn't appear in the original Top Gear Rally you could literally beat your car up until it looked like a trash can on wheels. What you now get instead is damage to the car appearing on the screen, which can be repaired after each race. This is all fairly comprehensive and you do get to upgrade pretty much any part of the car on the repair screen, but there is one major flaw.

Crash And Burn

The damage itself is far too random. At times you will misjudge a corner, careering the back end of your vehicle into a wall, and the game will inform you that one of your rear tyres is punctured and the rear drive train is bust. This is fair enough, but sometimes when you're driving down a straight stretch of road and hit a bump, the whole car will fall apart around you for no reason at all. These are supposed to be rally cars, not your run-of-the-mill family wagons!

At times, this game can feel as if you're driving a family car instead of a super-tuned sports demon. The controls are easier to get to grips with than in the first game but oddly, powerslides, which were easy in Top Gear Rally, are difficult as a result. The game itself isn't too hard to start with, but does get challenging towards the final stages. If only an Arcade mode or a Time Trial challenge had been included to provide some variety. All in all, TGR 2 is just an average racing game with its fair share of ups and downs.

Rally fans should know Kemco's T6R 2 has a few tricks up its sleeve, most notably a track-generation system capable of creating courses on-the-fly. The fledgling system could theoretically produce an infinite amount of roadways. In addition, 15 cars and loads of licensed parts and upgrades are included. No word if the vehicles will be licensed. This Safflre-created game is a winter '99 release.