By Elias Dounis on October 24th, 2004

In 1986, Sega brought to the arcade scene one of the most influential racing games in videogame history with OutRun. While it may have been a “must play” game at the time, its sequel fails to appeal to the mass amount of gamers as the original did. The game feels too much like its predecessor, and as you can imagine in modern times with racers like Project Gotham Racing 2 and Burnout 3 on the Xbox, there isn’t much of an incentive to try OutRun 2. But despite being outdone by other titles on the market, OutRun 2 is still an entertaining game, one that I’m sure fans of the original will appreciate greatly.

OutRun 2 is everything an arcade racer once represented. The game is very simple in terms of controls, you use the analog stick for steering and the L & R triggers respectively as the brake and gas pedals. The game’s controls aren’t realistic, but functional in a way that it’s possible to make a hard turn at 120mph with little difficulty.

There isn’t anything too complicated about the game’s mechanics, however the act of sliding or drifting does not function in a favorable fashion. It seems to be overdone and at times not much of a helpful technique during a race. In most instances it’s best to avoid drifting altogether, that is unless it’s unavoidable or called upon by a specific game scenario. Since it’s over-exaggerated, drifting often results in a negative outcome, one that is worse than if players were to slow down and attempt to make the turn. Oddly enough, during a race with other opponents, they’ll manage to use drifting in a way that propels them ahead of the other racers at high speeds. In addition, it seems that the actual technique is controlled by the game to some extent. Even if you try to intentionally spin the car around 180 or 360 degrees, the game will not let you. It’s a questionable trait, yet it’s not the only one found in the game.

Collisions with other vehicles aren’t really collisions. When plowing into a vehicle, whether it’s an opponent or a vehicle flowing in traffic, if hitting them from behind, the player’s vehicle will simply bounce back while the other actually gets pushed forward. The same happens if done otherwise with players getting hit from behind. Does it make sense? Not in the slightest, and speed

With licensed Ferraris racing at speeds up to 180mph, it’d be pretty safe to assume that OutRun 2 is a very fast game, and luckily it is. The sense of speed is one of the game’s best accomplishments. However, despite presenting a good sense of speed, the game still doesn’t feel fast enough for the speedometer to be reaching 180mph. Not helping this situation much is the fact that when there’s traffic on the tracks, these vehicles seem to be traveling at fast speeds as well. I for one have never witnessed anyone legally driving at 120mph on an expressway, so it seems a bit out of place for the game’s traffic to be traveling at these speeds. Nevertheless, it’s fun to drive through traffic, but it’s not a gameplay feature that we haven’t seen before, or experienced on a level that is far superior than that of OutRun 2’s. Anyone who has played any one of Criterion’s Burnout games can tell you this, because driving through oncoming traffic is a sweet sense of satisfaction, and unfortunately that sense of satisfaction isn’t anywhere to be found in OutRun 2.

One of OutRun 2’s weakest point is its track design. The tracks featured aren’t anything you’ll find in a traditional racer. The turns given aren’t anything too difficult. No hairpin turns or anything of the sort, but then again, it’s not exactly that type of game. Still, you’ll never be making any kind of lap around a track, and the game does have that feeling in which players almost lose their train of thought and just maneuver through courses mindlessly. However, this affect isn’t as strong as it is in other racers like Lotus Challenge and R: Racing Revolution and it only effects the game’s Arcade Mode since the game’s

The arcade version of OutRun 2 had been developed by Sega’s AM2 development studio. However, for the Xbox version of the game, Sumo Digital had been given the burden of making a worthwhile game out of a simple arcade racer, and it has to some extent. If OutRun 2 were to have made its transition to the Xbox with just a straight port of the arcade game, I’m pretty sure most people purchasing this title would’ve been pissed.

The arcade mode of OutRun 2 isn’t anything too spectacular. Much like the original game from mid 80s, OutRun 2’s arcade mode allows for a branching a path of tracks, whose difficulty increases when players go on the right-side path when reaching a checkpoint, or whose difficulty decreases when staying on the left. In arcade mode you’re given the option of racing against the clock and traffic in OutRun Challenge, listen to given commands and perform various stunts in Heart Attack mode, or be challenged to a Time Attack mode which requires for players to beat given times and their own previous records. In all truth, these modes aren’t too appealing. I’d say that they would appeal to players for no more than thirty minutes. However, there is an incentive to reaching the five different end points of the Arcade mode’s OutRun Challenge. And what is it? Well, doing so unlocks the complete and original OutRun game.

What Sumo Digital brought to the table with this Xbox version of OutRun 2 are the OutRun Challenge and Xbox Live modes. OutRun Challenge is without question the area in which most players will be spending their time with the game. In this mode players are given challenges to complete. These challenges range from drifting excessively in specified regions of a track, knocking over cones, driving through heavy traffic, speed challenges, to the interesting memorization and math challenges. While most of these challenges are pretty self-explanatory, the math and memorization challenges aren’t as easy to explain. The math challenges involve taking notice of the numbers passed while driving through the game’s courses and adding them together. Numbers like "9," followed by "-12," which is then followed by "+15" appear on-screen, and then players must go through the correct branching path, which has the answer to the addition problem of those numbers highlighted above (The answer is "12," for those who are curious). Now, the memorization

I must say that all of the challenges the game features are rather entertaining, and, at times, extremely difficult to complete. Sure, we’ve seen similar things before in games like Project Gotham Racing 2 (which pulls off cone gate challenges much better than OutRun 2, I might add) but their addition to the game makes the game much more appealing than it would’ve been otherwise. In what is sure to please hardcore gamers, these challenges are exactly what they should be, extremely challenging and difficult. As players complete challenges and move onto more difficult ones, they will have to improve their skills and their understanding of the game. These challenges can at times even become extremely frustrating and players need to be in their top form to complete the latter ones. However, unlike most games, there are rewards for completing these difficult tasks. These rewards come in the form of unlockable vehicles, songs, stages, reversed stages, and a gallery of photos featuring actual Ferrari merchandise which can be purchase off of Ferrari’s online store (a Ferrari mountain bike?). These unlockables undeniably add to the lasting appeal of the game.

I had mentioned that players would need to improve their understanding of the game. What this means is that players must learn that different cars need to be used for specific challenges. If this is not realized, they will be going through challenges over and over again until they realize that they need a Ferrari with better acceleration or a Ferrari with a higher top speed. Trust me when I say that this can be extremely frustrating. For instance, there had one been one point in the game where, despite being in 1st place, I kept on failing the mission because I couldn’t reach the next check point in time. What I soon found out was that selecting a car with better acceleration would result in me easily completing the mission which I had failed dozens of times before.

As for the game’s Xbox Live modes, they’re pretty much the same as the game’s multi-player modes. Of course, racing against seven human opponents is thrilling, but there isn’t anything too special about it that makes OutRun 2’s Xbox Live modes an opinion-changing gameplay feature. Luckily, the servers on Live have been holding up very well. However, there aren’t too many people playing the North American version of the game at the current time on Live. Why? Well, the only others playing the game at the time are those who managed to get a copy of the game from retailers who have broken the street date of the game. Hopefully, when the game is officially released, there will be more players to enjoy the game’s Xbox Live modes with. Now onto the game’s visuals.

OutRun 2’s visuals can be best described as "colorful." Vibrant colors are used to add to the game’s flair and atmosphere. It’s obvious from the get go that the game isn’t going for that realistic approach, and the visuals show this. This isn’t to say that OutRun 2 is a bad looking game, because as you can see from the screen-shots of the game, OutRun 2 is actually quite the visual pleaser. What’s most impressive about the game are its car models. They’re excellent representations of the Ferraris they’ve been modeled after, and although games like Project Gotham Racing 2 have featured ones that are more realistic thanks to believable texture work, those featured in OutRun 2 still look great. Additionally, the game features some clean texture work. However, what prevents this game from being a great looking game are character models featured, the car models of the game’s flowing traffic, and its shaky frame rate. Both the character models and the vehicles which comprise the game’s traffic aren’t too detailed in relation to polygonal composition. In fact, they’re reminiscent of those featured in the original Crazy Taxi, which at the time were plausible, but which in modern times aren’t. About the game’s frame rate, for the most part is holds up very well at 60fps, but there are instances, often when drifting onto surfaces other than the paved road, when you will see it stagger. Fortunately, these moments aren’t encountered much, but they do exist nevertheless.

The soundtrack of OutRun 2 is comprised of remixed tracks of those featured in the original OutRun arcade game from the mid 80s, and the word that can be used to best describe OutRun 2’s soundtrack is “cheesy.” Of course, those overrun with nostalgia will refuse to believe this, but it’s the truth. However, over time players will become accustomed to the game’s featured songs. This is mostly due to the fact that when playing through the game’s Challenge Mode, more remixes of these songs, and even the original versions, can be unlocked. It’s almost as if players are forced to like them, and I must admit that they have been pounded into my own head enough that I’ve found myself thinking about them from time to time. What’s unfortunate is that there’s no option to switch to your own custom soundtrack, a feature that would have become extremely helpful when playing this game. Of course, there’s also the option of turning off the game’s music entirely during races, but it doesn’t seem to be much of an improvement. While the engines of the game’s featured Ferraris sound authentic, the banter of the chick in shotgun and the retro-sounding, “blocky” effects of going over different terrains sounds like crap compared to the auditory bliss we’ve been experiencing in modern racers.

So what’s the deal with OutRun 2? Well, I can say that from my own experience that initially the game isn’t too appealing. It’s almost as if its flaws become immediately visible. However, after going deeper into the game’s OutRun Challenge mode, things got much more interesting and, more importantly, entertaining. I can’t say that OutRun 2 is an amazingly great racer, but it is good enough to keep players occupied and entertained for a good amount of time.