WipEout

Is it me or are there a lot of racing games currently on the market all of a sudden? WipEout is a new arcade style racing game from Sony's newly acquired Psygnosis division and I am happy to say it's a good one. This futuristic racing game puts you behind the wheel of a anti-gravity hover craft (an offshoot of some abandoned military research project) speeding along space age tracks. The tracks feature loops, jumps over bottomless pits, tight hairpin turns and tunnels. If you don't make a jump, time is lost waiting for the hovering tow truck to haul your sorry ass out of the chasm.

By driving over colored areas on the track, you can also collect weapons to shoot at other racers. The weapons don't kill the other drivers, they just slow them down long enough to pass them. But don't get too close to the car you are aiming at! Once I shot a car near a cliff, plowed into the back of the disabled car and next thing I knew I was sliding down a cliff! There are a variety of weapons including mines, shock waves, rockets and missiles. Some weapons can be fired at opponents in front of you while others like the mines can take out that guy in your draft. Of course your opponents can also pick up weapons which keeps the driving interesting because you have to dodge incoming missiles as well as turns. Pick up shields for temporary protection or turbo boosts for incredible quick burst of speed -- just don't activate it on a tight turn!

EXPERIENCE IT

This game has a great environment. From the funky futuristic typeface and graphics to the excellent techno sound track by CoLD StoRAGE (which you can play in your stereo), wipEout sets the stage for all out anti-gravity racing. The speeding track is quite convincing although the detail of the track could be sharper and at times its a little confusing. But after a few practice laps it becomes second nature. I found myself laying back and letting the grooves of the soundtrack put my body in a lull as my subconscious mind took control of the speeding anti-grav craft. Actually its quite relaxing, sort of a Zen thing. I was using a Virtual PilotPro from CH Products and the steering was smooth as silk. The only drawback is that you can't use the airbrakes with a joystick, you still have to use the "z" and "x" keys on the keyboard to negotiate tight turns. This is one of the drawbacks of a game ported from a game console, in this case the Sony Playstation, but the problem could have been fixed with a more advanced joystick configuration setup. The joystick configuration calibrates the x and y axis of the stick but not the buttons. Even if you have a four button joystick you can only use two of the buttons for acceleration and firing. The other option is to use the mouse for steering, accelerating and firing but you will still need your other hand on the keyboard for high speed braking. My other pet peeve against wipEout and a lot of other racing games currently on the market is the lack of a rear view mirror. It sure would be nice to know if someone is coming up on your tail with a rocket before it knocks you off the track!

Graphic System Shock

Graphically wipEout is a full frontal shock to the system. Lightening fast graphics whiz by you and the backgrounds are fully rendered with trees, crowds of race fans, mountains etc. For slower machines you can change the size of the window and reduce the amount of detail if your computer can't keep up with the graphics. My only complaint here is that the speed of the graphics seem to come at the expense of resolution. A few of the menu screens are almost unreadable. I think that somewhere in the porting process they forgot to sharpen the graphics for monitor viewing. Some screens that probably looked fine on a TV screen, look fuzzy on a computer monitor.

Half Hearted Two Player Support

Two players can compete via a null modem cable (serial cable connection). Unfortunately this means both computers have to be in the same room since there isn't any modem support. This seems to be another by product of porting a game from a game console to the PC environment (Playstation allows this type of two player connection) since Sony's other new game, Destruction Derby, also has this limitation.

A Winner!

Overall, playing wipEout is a very satisfying racing experience. The hyper cool environment, fast graphics, great soundtrack and selection of tracks makes it a great arcade racing experience.

Review By GamesDomain