Game: Truck Racing 2
Console: Sony Playstation 2
Developer: Brain In a Jar
Release Date: 28th October 2005
For those of you familiar with Midas Interactive, I shouldn't have to explain too much more about this game. For those of you who aren't familiar with them however, imagine if 99p Stores were a video game publisher. As well as publishing the Simple Series in the UK market, they oversaw the making of far too many poor quality titles to list, with nearly their entire output being crappy budget games.
Truck Racing 2 is the sequel to Truck Racing on the Playstation, another Midas offering that I've not yet played. While there's no evidence to suggest that the original game is of particularly poor quality, the screenshots on the back of the box for Truck Racing 2 show trucks flying off the track at all angles, a lapse in quality that you wouldn't have thought they'd want to advertise. Upon booting the game, it's fairly obvious that the game engine and much of the game's content is shared with another Midas title; Golden Age of Racing (review here).
Golden Age of Racing suffered from a few gameplay issues; no amount of braking was ever enough to turn a corner (which makes a little more sense with trucks), and collisions were always oddly hilarious with the small racing cars flying up into the sky. Truck Racing 2 shares these issues and more, with collisions looking all the more ridiculous thanks to larger vehicles, and the ability to get stuck in the floor (as shown above) which I achieved within the first 10 minutes of playing.
If this wasn't a Midas Interactive game, I'd have been shocked at the sheer cynicism of repackaging an existing game with different vehicles and selling it again, but the fact that this game includes most of the courses, physics and assets from Golden Age of Racing is to be expected of Midas. I'm just sorry that there's not any further hilarity to be had with new glitches or issues. The main modes of the game are Championship and Challenge; a few race series, and a best lap competition, both as frustrating as the other given the handling featured in the game.
Graphically the game is fairly poor with low resolution tracks, backgrounds, crowd effects and trucks. It's a struggle to maintain a decent frame-rate, and crashing trucks only slows the game down further. The sound is pretty average and will soon be drowned out by laughter when one truck sends another off into space, only to land out of bounds and get stuck in the floor. There's a relaxing track featured on the menu screen, which I'd say is the best part of the game.
Overall Truck Racing 2 is a poor game when taken as a standalone and a lazy re-use of a game engine when considered within Midas's release schedule. The amount of fun that can be had with this title is minimal unless you're planning to exploit all of its bugs with a friend, and even then there's really not much content.
Rating: 30/100
Grade: E
Game: Super Trucks
Console: Sony Playstation 2
Developer: Jester Interactive
Release Date: 29th October 2003
Released almost a full two years before Truck Racing 2, Super Trucks was an officially licensed game of the FIA European Truck Racing Championship which continues to this day. With a good choice of licensed trucks and their drivers, the game beats Truck Racing 2 with it selection, despite some being locked at the start of the game. The modes available are still somewhat lacking though as Arcade is a long string of races with a target position for each, and Championships range from a 3 race, 3 lap series with 5 opponents to the full championship schedule once unlocked.
The handling featured in the game is far better than that of Truck Racing 2, with most corners being easy to tackle with just a little braking. There's a little bit of drift if corners are taken too fast, but overall the steering feels slightly too loose for such big trucks being raced. The collision physics are probably the worst aspect as there's no real impact when trucks collide, and it's too easy to be spun out from the back by an AI opponent.
With many real world tracks featured in the game, there's a great variety of layouts to experience and some will really test players ability to handle such a large vehicle. Another interesting feature is the brake cooling meter which shows players the temperature of their brakes, which increases each time they're used and can be decreased by pressing the L2 button to release water, cooling them. In longer races this must be used strategically in order to avoid overheating the brakes and thus being able to corner less effectively.
The AI in the game aren't the most intelligent and will frequently go off course or bunch up on the corners in an odd way. This makes most of the racing too easy for players to win as getting past the AI clusters will save a lot of time. With a maximum of 10 trucks on track at any given time, there's a good sense of exciting racing though, and the frame rate isn't as affected by having to render more trucks as you might think.
Graphically the game looks dated to modern eyes, but at the time of its release wouldn't have been too bad at all. Compared to Truck Racing 2 it looks a lot sharper and more realistic, especially the trucks and circuits featured within the game. Unfortunately there's not a lot to hear music-wise, despite the fact that tracks play behind the racing action. If there'd been a few more songs, I probably wouldn't have minded as much, but turning the music down in the options menu is a must.
Overall Super Trucks isn't an amazing racing game by any means, but there's far more of a sense of controlling a large truck than with any other truck racing game I've played, it's fully licensed with a good range of tracks, trucks and drivers, and the championships are a legitimate if slightly boring progression through the game, which Truck Racing 2 sorely lacks.
Rating: 62/100
Grade: C
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