Sprint Cars: Road to Knoxville – PS2 – Review

Sprint Cars
isn’t like most racing games. It hasn’t been hyped for years leading up to its
release. You won’t find full-page ads in every single magazine. You probably
won’t see it advertised on national television (and if you did, not very
often). It’s a shorter, quieter game, not only in its marketing punch but also
in the way it was designed. Created for a niche market, Sprint Cars uses
buggies, real-world physics, and other elements you won’t find in the typical
racer.

On the
physics end, the game has begun to make a name for itself. Steering does not
follow the expected, extremely-tight control schemes of most arcade racers.
Technically this is not supposed to be an arcade racer, but its simplicity
makes it come across as one. Once you’ve taken the game for a spin, the
classification doesn’t matter nearly as much as what’s under the hood.

At first the
steering seems slippery – too difficult to just pick up and get into without a
lot of practice. You’ll have to almost forget everything you know about the
current crop of racers and go with the flow. The game wants you to take turns
slowly while maintaining a high speed. Turns can be very slippery, partially
because of the type of vehicle you’re controlling. The other reason is that
nearly every surface you ride on is covered in dirt. These aren’t the best
driving conditions, but there are ways to work around the most difficult
parts.

An easy,
cheap, and not always effective gameplay shortcut is to avoid using the brake
while going into a turn. Ease off the gas and try to steer as far away from
the turn as possible (turn left). If done properly you’ll have slowed down
enough to make it out of the turn safely, and will be able to accelerate fast
enough to keep up with the competition.

If instead
you had held onto the gas the whole time and occasionally tapped the brake
button (a solution that for old racing titles like Daytona USA), you’d hit the
wall or spin out. Solid braking just means you’ll slow down, which is fine if
you don’t mind losing a position or 10 in the race. In all seriousness, you
don’t want to slow down.

A spin-out
is as close to suicide as you can get on these race tracks. On the bright side
that means you can hit your opponents from the side (when they get caught up
in a turn they cant handle), causing them to spin out and fall victim to
spin-out doom. Chances are you won’t have to deal with them anymore during
that particular race, assuming you don’t spin out yourself.

The game
isn’t that fast to begin with, but when you reach max speed, it’s a good idea
to try and keep it there. Catching up to a pack of cars that has just gone by
is no easy task. The game will tell you that you don’t have to win every race
to be a winner at the end of the day – that’s true (there are practice and
qualifying rounds, heats, etc.). But you do have to win the main race if you
want to get more than a few points. Without them you’ll never crack the top
five.

Cracking the
top five can be a bit of a challenge when the game also has an illegal lap
rule. I don’t know the exact definition, but it seems to go something like
this: if you, at any given time, decide to veer off course and don’t get back
on immediately after doing so, the game considers it an "illegal lap." Now all
your opponents get to pass you until you’ve made up that lost time.

It’s a smart
rule – without it everyone would cut through the middle and rush to the finish
line. But it also means having to keep a close eye on where you’re going.
Sometimes illegal laps can be caused by an uncontrollable spin-out. You’ll
feel doubly beaten when that happens, as there’s little room for recovery
outside of the re-start function.

Outside of
the music and graphics, which don’t make or break any game, the only area
where Sprint Cars fails is track design. This, as many hardcore gamers know,
is the most important aspect next to great controls. The problem here is
simple: all you do is turn left. I kept hoping for a different course style
(maybe a right turn here and there?). I kept thinking there’d be something
different (a wide left followed by a sharp left?).

Slightly
different graphics – various backgrounds, night or day lighting – are about as
far as the changes go. The courses are more of an oval shape than a circle,
but the idea is the same, and it doesn’t take more than a few races before
you’ll begin to lose interest.

Review Scoring Details for Sprint Cars: Road to Knoxville

Gameplay: 6.0
Decent controls,
cool (but repetitive) vehicles, and appropriate gameplay guidelines are this
game’s strongest features. The lack of track variety, however, doesn’t give
the player much to do. After turning left for the 100th time, it doesn’t make
the idea of doing it again too exciting.

Graphics: 4.0
Given that this
is a budget title, top-notch graphics were not expected. But the overall
graininess and lack of detail – it’s enough to make you think we’ve gone back
a generation.

Sound: 5.0
This is a
low-priced racer, and with that comes a lower budget, leading to weaker
graphics and even weaker music and sound effects.

Difficulty: Easy/Medium
Turning left is
no easy task. Actually it is – but not when you have to deal with unforgiving
opponents who know their way in and out of a spin-out.

Concept: 7.0
When’s the last
time you’ve seen a sprint car game on the market? This is a sub-genre rarely
tackled, and it’s especially nice to see a game that does it with
above-average controls. If the courses had been a bit more fantasy and a lot
less reality, with lots of twists and turns (and not just another big circle),
Sprint Cars would’ve easily reached the checkered flag.

Multiplayer: 5.5
Attention spans
lessen when gamers play together. It doesn’t take more than 15 minutes before
the constant, circular driving forces someone to sit up and say, “Are there
any other tracks in this game? Really? Uhhh, well…” Now nobody’s reaching for
the controller.

Overall: 5.9
Sprint Cars
wasn’t going to win any awards for great graphics or some other secondary,
less-important feature. The gameplay mechanics, however, are much more
polished than the courses you’re racing on. Racing games depend on both
(driving mechanics and course layout) to immerse the player in the experience.
When one’s missing, the other falls apart. I’m sad to say that’s what happened
here. Sprint Cars has enough power under its hood to grow as a series, but
it’s going to take more than one element to make it happen.