Supercross 2000

Acclaim's doin' it in the dirt with its upcoming off-road racer, Supercross. Jump on a crotch rocket and hit the hills on seven international tracks filled with mud, sand, mud, water, ice, mud. gravel, and mud! Grab a friend for the split-screen mode and get messy on both arena supercross and outdoor motocross tracks. Acclaim promises realistic bike handling as well as death-defying jumps, wicked hairpin turns, and--for the less skilled-spectacular wipeouts. But, hey. isn't that why people watch motocross in the first place?

Overview

Welcome to the world of EA Sports' Supercross action. In this installment you will find 24 real Supercross and freestyle (trick) riders, actual tracks and accurate motorcycle physics, and of course you also get real commentators. The best stuff, though, is the amount of cool tricks and the realism that is all over this game. As the riders go through each track they develop ruts and grooves where the bikes have worn down the whoops and jumps. Another of the really cool additions to this title is the Stuntcam™ PIP View, for when you catch that mad air and do a wild pancake whip.

Gameplay

This is game is seriously cool and is a must-have for any die-hard fan. Unfortunately, the die-hards are the only people who will enjoy the game for more than a few hours. The problem is that there are really only two modes of play, regular races and freestyle, and they don’t stand the test of time. I played through an entire Supercross season and several freestyle races and found myself wanting more, but to no avail. This game has tons to give in the realism arena and the "make you feel like you’re there" element that EA Sports does really well, but it left me wanting a lot more when I got through the race season. Unfortunately, more wasn’t really there. You can use another rider, but the difference to my untrained hands was only cosmetic; or you can do another season, but the only way to make that more interesting is to make races longer to allow the ruts and grooves to develop and complicate your race lines. It takes at least four laps for enough ruts to appear to make you actually change your race line and the initial setting is five laps to a race.

As I mentioned above, this game shines when it comes to realism. What this means for you is that these little two-strokes are going to have you all over the track for the first few races. If you have ever ridden a motorcycle you know that they are more difficult to control than they look and if you have ever ridden a dirt-bike you know that they are even more unruly, especially when the surface gets more and more irregular. So as you can imagine, the bikes in this game take a bit to get used to, but for me that made it a much more appealing game. I really enjoyed learning the tricks for how to make a really good turn; when to use the burns on the outside and when to just drop the throttle and gun it. I had a lot of fun learning each of the tracks and figuring out when I could go for the big air.

One drawback for me was the ability to screw up and get the bike into a corner in the track model and have a really hard time getting out. There are a number of places in this game where if you go too far to the outside of a turn, you might slide off the jump at the end and get caught next to an invisible wall. This kind of thing just really turns me off to a game. I know it’s impossible to find every conceivable problem before a game is released, but this kind of problem is tough to forgive.

Graphics

The graphics on this one are solid. Good clean views and a consistent quality frame-rate. With the kind of pile-ups that I was seeing (causing), I found that to be a huge benefit.

Audio

The commentators are good, but I have to say that they got on my nerves by the end of the first season. They just didn’t have enough interesting things to say and once you hear them say the same thing about ten times, you will just want to turn down the sound and pretend it isn’t there.

Bottom Line

This is a great game if you want a decent simulation of Supercross action or are a die-hard dirt-bike racing fan. However, for the casual gamer, this game will not stay in the PSX very long. It just doesn’t keep the interest alive long enough. It is a fun game, just not for long...

Moto Racer and Castrol Honda Superbike Racing are just not enough motorcycle action for EA. Now an exclusive motocross sim featuring licensed bikes--Honda, Kawasaki, etc., and 25 of the world's top Supercross and Freestyle riders are on tap for a fall 99 release. Both supercross and Freestyle competition are featured. Other notables include: Create-a-Rider, two-player and TV-style announcing.

Mud wrestling gets a mental mechanical makeover!

Why is it that when you wait ages for something to come along, loads turn up at once? Not only is Supercross 2000 here, but just a short distance behind in its muddy spray wait Excite Bike, Jeremy McGrath Supercross and Top Gear Rally. Obviously someone out there thinks that the consumer has developed a dirt and mud fetish. At least EA has the upper hand and has managed to get its game out before the market is totally saturated, but is it actually any good?

You certainly get value for money with this game, which offers a grand total of 24 tracks and 24 riders, all of which are officially licenced and based on real life counterparts. Unfortunately, all of the riders and locations are American, but it's nice to know that they're there. Besides, fans of the sport are sure to take great pleasure in such perfection.

Muddy Madness

When you initially kickstart this game to life, the first thing you'll see is that there are quite a few modes of play. One warning - avoid the freestyle arenas at all costs! EA may have been trying to give this game a hip look, but it just feels as though the freestyle mode was thrown in as an afterthought. As a result this section just feels dull and repetitive, and isn't helped any by the game's biggest flaw, the controls.

'Biggest flaw' in fact is probably too kind a term for what is a truly game- destroying feature. It's not that the bike doesn't feel right, because the physics as it rides over jumps and bumps are superb. Where the game really falls down is when you try and negotiate a corner - the emphasis here is on the word 'try'! The only way to turn the bike is by powering it around the comers, but when you put the power on, even at low speeds, the turning circle is for too high. This can be countered to some extent by shifting your weight on the bike with the stick, but otherwise the bike usually ends up going around the outside boundaries. Naturally, the computer- controlled bikes don't have this problem.

Bumpy Ride

What this means is that, with no extensive straights, the races have very stop-start gameplay. On the lower difficulty levels, invisible walls keep you on the track, stopping you in the process, but when you reach the higher levels you are continually shooting off the course at every jump and having to restart back down the track, which is even more annoying!

When you do get up to speed, the game still runs at a fairly decent rate with no noticeable slowdown. With the Expansion Pak in full force the game looks great, until you pick up the controller. Don't be surprised if nobody will play you at this for more than ten minutes (although that's actually a good thing, as it's only two-player anyway).

If you do manage to stick it out and learn the controls, races can be won. You can actually start to attack some of the corners by flying off jumps into them and landing at an angle. Before each race, to help you win, you can customise your bike set-up changing gear ratios, suspension and traction. None of this means a thing however, because the uncooperative controls and lack of a four-player option do ruin what could otherwise have been a superb game. Let's hope the contenders learn from EA's mistake.

The first dirt bike racing to hit the N64 has arrived and nobody was more excited about it than I was. I have mentioned a number of times how much I love racing games and I really enjoy racing games that have a different angle than just street racing. Supercross 2000 is the first of four game that will be released within the next month that take on the dirt bike arena. While being first is worth something, I hope that this will not be the best dirt racer on the system otherwise fans of this type of racing will not be happy.

Supercross 2000 features 24 real life riders (I know that some are real so I am assuming that they all are) and 16 real stadium tracks and uses the memory Pak for a graphical kick. There are plenty of different types of racing and different skill levels which effect more than just the opponents skill levels. While this game may not be the best dirt bike racer ever, read on and see if it fits your gaming style.

Gameplay

I don't know what it is lately but I seem to be playing games that I really don't like when I first start playing. This game was no exception. After my first race, I was amazed that they could have released this game with the awful controls but after playing for a few more races and reading the manual to learn a few tricks, my opinion started to change. Not only did my opinion change but my understanding of the game did as well. Let me explain.

Most racing games fall into one of two categories. They are either arcade style racers (who needs a stinking brake?) or simulation (trying to be as realistic as possible). Up until now, just about every motorbike racing game I have played fell heavily under the arcade racer influence. The idea was flying around tracks, catching big air, and pulling off tricks. Since this is what I was expecting, it is easy to see why I did not like the game at first. I figured that I would keep the gas on full throttle the whole race, tap the brakes occasionally and win all of the races. As soon as I went into the first turn, it became very obvious that this strategy was not going to work.

Once it became clear to me that Supercross 2000 was aiming at capturing the simulation market, I knew that I was in trouble. In a panic, I resorted to reading the manual to see if I could pick up a few tricks to help me win. It did not take long before I found what I was looking for. Apparently there is something called fanning the clutch that helps you turn. So what I had to do was slow down going into corners and pop the clutch in and out (controlled by the Z trigger) and it helped slide my back tire around and got me heading in the direction of the corner. This took a lot of getting used to but once I mastered it, I really started to appreciate it. I got pretty good at timing it for optimal performance and found that it actually enhanced the game much more than I ever expected.

Also since it is a simulation, there is no going full speed into the corner and whipping out the other side by fanning the clutch a little. This game really makes you think about how you are driving and also what you are going to do up ahead before you reach the corners. All of the tracks are made up of sharp corners that require you to come almost to a complete stop so if you try to hit them at a high speed, you will never make it. This is going to take some people a while to get used to but if you stick with it, I think you will start to appreciate the game for what it is.

I first started playing the game on the beginner setting and I was all set to rip it apart because it seemed to have invisible walls that keep you on the track. Plus, I would constantly knock the other racers off their bikes but I would almost never fall. I really thought this was lame but like any good reviewer, I decide to play all of the modes before ripping the game. Good thing I did because the things that I was going to complain about were gone. It seems that they put in the invisible walls to help you in the beginner mode but not in the pro mode. If you go off the track, you get a penalty and have to start from a dead stop, plus it is much easier to crash. Top it off with the fact that the bikes go faster in the pro mode and now the game gets really challenging. Hell, it gets damn near impossible to win.

One of the neatest things that this game has is the Freestyle mode. The freestyle mode is a big, open arena with jumps placed around so you can just drive around and pull off tricks. You have a set time limit and you receive points for pulling off tricks. Think of it as a half-pipe in a snowboarding game. This mode was fun and quite inventive but the trick system was fairly limited so after I played a few times and pulled off all of the tricks, some of the fun wore off. It is still something that I pull out when I have a couple of buddies around so they can do some cool tricks.

There were a few things that bothered me about the game that really kept it from being great in my eyes. First and foremost, the rider's physics just seemed off. I never really felt like I was riding a motorcycle. I was constantly bending and contorting in mid air in ways that just were not natural. I also would find myself having a difficult time staying on the track because the slightest touch of the steering would send me off in a side-to-side rampage that was tough to stop.

The game also had some collision detection problems. I would constantly get stuck in places and it was very difficult to get unstuck. I would run into other riders and go right through them. Plus, on the pro levels, I really did not like how the game handled it when I went off course. It just put up a message that I had gone off the course and started me over back in the middle. I almost would have liked to have seen the game have me jump off the bike and try pushing it back on the track or something like in real life. I don't know. It just seemed too abrupt and unnatural.

Graphics

For N64 graphics, I must say I was impressed. The riders were all animated very nicely. They would lean into turns and put a foot down to stabilize them. The crashes had the riders sliding across the ground in a very painful looking way. I was playing with the Ram Pak and everything looked good. When I got close to some of the walls, the writing looked bad but it was hardly noticeable. Overall, the graphics are pretty good.

Bottom Line

This game will really make you slow down and pay attention to the simulation aspects of dirt bike racing. If you don't think that would be your type of game, I suggest you stay away from this one because you will only get frustrated. If you are the type of gamer who is willing to invest the time in learning how to control the bikes, you should have some fun with this title. I really liked the freestyle courses but did get bored with them after a while. This game is not for everyone but it is worth a rental to see if it is right for you.

Why must every company release a motocross game at once? Is there something we don't know? EA's Supercross 2000 takes a slightly different approach by playing up the freestyle option. Hit the ramp, fiddle with the joystick and watch your rider perform some nifty maneuvers. Like snowboarding, you're judged on style and difficulty. Regular racing packs over 10 tracks and lots of real riders--Larry Ward, jeff Emig, Damon Huffman and several others. Control is a bit tricky--instead of the standard hard-lean option you have to manipulate the clutch and brake to make the corners. Even then it's not as fluid as we'd like. Unfortunately the bikes are not licensed but they do come in 125 and 250 classes. Supercross 2000 is available now.

Supercross has been burgeoning in popularity lately, and EA Sports is the latest to get its tires dirty with Supercross 2000. The game looks to satisfy both racers and freestylers with full-season supercross action and trick-packed freestyle jump-off contests. Players will be able to chose 25 "top" pros, though their names weren't available at press time. The bike lineup includes Honda CRs, Yamaha YZs, Kawasaki KXs, and Suzuki RMs, and gamers will also be able to create their own riders.

The racing is set in stadiums replete with triple jumps and tabletops, and as the lap count grows, ruts and grooves will form, affecting the handling. On the freestyle side, riders will be able to pull off. dozens of stunts ranging from tail whips to nac-nacs. Throughout both styles of racing, EA Sports is promising to deliver realistic physics and handling. Finally, Supercross 2000 will provide two-man commentary led by David Bailey, and two players will be able to race in a split-screen mode.