January
20, 2003
I'm
going to play devil's advocate here. While the recently released
version of Sega's Daytona USA on Dreamcast is a very fine
game, it seems to be, well, lacking something. Maybe it's the memory
of an earlier home version of Daytona from many moons ago;
ironically, that much-maligned title is the better effort.
Released
as a launch title for Sega's 32-bit game console in 1995, the Saturn
port of Daytona USA looked ragged, at best. The small color
palette, the rough framerate, and the legendary "pop-up"
have been endlessly harped at for years; we all know that this game
wasn't good-looking. But, as some of you may learn as you grow older,
looks aren't everything. Daytona on Saturn played like
a dream. It was always hugely popular wherever I showed up with
my Sega console, more so than flashier games like Sega Rally
or Virtua Fighter 2. In fact, I still think the original
version is a better game (forget the graphics)
than the DC version.
1
- The cars were a lot smarter. The AI in Daytona
is what made it such a fabulous game to play. The computer cars
feint, swerve, and contest for position not only against you, but
the other computer-controlled cars, as well. Oftentimes, reckless
cars will come out of nowhere and try to ram you off the road, making
powersliding in traffic risky. Dreamcast racing is never as fun.
Despite the occasional lane change, the computer cars never seem
to notice you're there. And bumping a car from behind inexplicably
teleports them ahead one car length, which kills the tension of
bumper-to-bumper traffic. Which leads me to…
2
- Massive car crashes. The great thrill of playing an 80-lap
game on the Easy track is knowing that, sooner or later, there's
going to be a 20-car pileup. And there's a good chance you'll be
in the middle of it. There's nothing quite like powersliding past
Sonic Mountain and then trying to dodge racecars falling from the
sky. By comparison, the Dreamcast version is tame. It's easy to
crash opposing cars, but you never see more than one car crashing
at a time. Computer cars safely dodge everything, and never try
to take you out. What happened to the competition?
3
- The racetracks were better. This must sound insane, seeing
as how there are eight courses on Dreamcast and only three on Saturn.
But the original arcade tracks were brilliant, offering three courses
that varied greatly in design, locale, and difficulty that are just
right. Three Seven is fairly easy, Dinosaur Canyon is challenging
but not too tough, and Sea-Side is damn hard. The Dreamcast features
the two tracks from Champion Circuit Edition; of these,
Desert City is good, but noticeably easier than the Saturn original
(it seems the corners were smoothed out), and Nat'l Park is as boring
as ever. Dreamcast Daytona offers three new courses; to
my complete amazement, none are any good. Gone are the tricky twists
and turns, replaced by wide lanes and long straight-aways. Where
is the challenge for the Daytona veteran? Who seriously
thought Three Sixty was too hard? I'm impressed at the lack of pop-up,
but this is ridiculous.
4
- There were more secrets. I realize I may be speaking
prematurely, as more hidden features may be discovered. But until
then, I'm not holding my breath. Saturn Daytona offered
more hidden cars, and even a horse - the coolest hidden "car"
of all time. Dreamcast Daytona offers, what, six cars?
Only one car for online play and no hidden courses? We're in the
post-Soul Calibur world; this is just lazy.
Finally…
5
- Saturn Daytona drove better. Needless to say,
the steering on DC Daytona is awful. Of course, changing
the joypad settings helps things somewhat, but this shouldn't even
be necessary. Didn't anyone playtest this game? What is it with
the lousy analog steering in driving games these days? Only Test
Drive Le Mans and Ferrari 355 seem to get it right;
maybe developers should develop for the joypad instead of the overpriced
steering wheels.
There
are many things I like in Dreamcast Daytona, like the excellent
two-player mode and online racing (when the servers actually work).
And this version is far better than the Saturn CCE that
limped its way out a few years ago. But despite all the hardware
power of the Dreamcast, it all comes down to the one thing that
looks can't change: gameplay. |
