dagoss's Cruis'n USA review

Good review. I especially liked the crossed out "new cars" bit, and your one-word impression of the soundtrack.

One thing though:

"While this might sound unfair – after all, that epitomizes almost every racing game..."

Did you mean "epitomize"?

Thanks for the compliments.

Did you mean "epitomize"?

Pronoun confusion. What I have is correct ("that" is a pronoun referring to the summary in the previous sentence, which would be singular), but I will revise it so that it is clearer.

No, no. I'm the one not being clear. What I meant was, is 'epitomize' the right word, rather than something like 'describe'?

If you're confident about it, feel free to ignore my two-and-a-half cents.

When I revised it based on my misunderstanding of what you meant, I inadvertently corrected what you really meant. Go me!

Ha, nice. I just checked it out; it reads quite perfectly now.

I agree with Masters, this is a pretty good review. I was planning on doing this game, like, today, but now I think I may wait and do something else instead.

I spotted some inaccuracies:

There's… …negligible difference between vehicles,

This is incorrect; beating the game on difficulties 1, 3 and 5 release superior updates of the current car, and the speed is noticeably faster in game. Granted, there is barely any difference between any of the four starter cars, but there are huge difference between the upgrades and those starters. You downplay the speed difference later on; the truth is, I'm playing through this currently, and I'm completing races that take under two minutes an average of five to ten seconds faster with the third tier than the second. It's a very real difference in speed. I'm stoked to test my reflexes with the fourth tier cars even if the graphics are atrocious.

The difficulty of this task can vary considerably due to a tightly wound rubber band connecting the AI controlled vehicles to your rear bumper.

This isn’t true either. Cruis’n USA has no rubber band AI (at least against you); if you can’t pull away from racers, it’s probably because you don’t have a car appropriate for that difficulty setting (or they caught up fair and square). Maybe things are different on difficulty 5 (Update: just beat it. they're not), but it's certainly not true for 1 or 3. My understanding is you're racing against cars that are just as fast/faster until you unlock the next tier; that's not rubber band AI.

The game does have rubber band AI that I've seen; it doesn’t let other racers get too far ahead of you if you do poorly. But I’ve pulled away time and again, especially after accidents bring down the front car or just from having a superior car, and I’ve never had anyone catch up despite crashes near the end unless it seemed plausible. (Update: The game even reports split times so you can measure your lead). You didn't play this enough before passing judgment here; see Mario Kart 64 for real rubber band AI on the console, not this.

Playing through the Cruisin' mode will take you through all ten courses consecutively,

There are fourteen courses.

You misunderstood what I said about the cars. There is a huge difference in the car "levels" (the different colours). I meant that there was little difference between the different cars, (eg the sporty looking car or the one that looks all gangsta -- obviously I know nothing about cars).

As for the rubber band AI, I will admit that I wrote this review largely from memory. I came home after a really bad day and wanted to take it out on a game, and that is exactly what I did.

Otherwise you made a lot of great, valid points (this isn't a good game, and it -is- a bad port). I think I had more fun with Cruis'n, so expect a review at some point soon, but I can't really disagree with the cardboard trees or driving through Iowa.