Old School Review: Rad Racer

[Saint_Michael 3]

I am sure most gamers by now have heard of Square, Squaresoft and its third incarnation Square-Enix, and odds are most gamers know about the RPG franchise this company has made as well. However, I doubt too many gamers know about a popular racing game that Square-Enix developed back in the 80s called Rad Racer. One of the few racing games made during the 80s for the NES, but what made this game so popular was its replay value, difficult and of course replay value. I spent countless hours to this game and at best made it to the third level and successfully entered the level cheat and got to level 8 but without beating it (lol).

 

Heck, my brother hard a hard time with this game and I don’t think he made it that far either, maybe level 5 level 6. However, he might have made it to level eight without beating it either but not too sure though. Of course, what made this a popular game as well were its features, such as changing the music for your gaming needs, or if you happen to have a pair of red and blue 3-D glasses, you could play this game in some good 3-D fashion as well. I believe that was the only game to use red and blue 3-D or 3-D in general in terms of having to wear a pair of 3-D glasses to play a video game. There was a sequel to this game never played it on the NES, a couple of times on a Emulator but it was lacking what the first had. As to what was lacking cannot think of it off the top of my head since it’s been awhile but it lacked something (lol). Well let us get on to my review and see how I rate this ever-popular racing game.

 

Rad Racer

 

Some Screen Shots

 

 

Game Maker: Square Co., Ltd.

 

Year: 1987

 

Price: $40-$50 a game

 

Levels: 8

 

Sound: 5 without the music 8 with the music,

 

Graphics: 7, good transition between night and day and some good depth.

 

Mini-Games: dodge the cars and the side of the road, well not really mini games but you get the point if you played this game.

 

Difficulty: Back then: 10 Now: 9

 

Game play: You the driver complete the course is the allotted time or you lose, pretty much it, had turbo to use on the straight a ways and gas and break buttons.

 

Plot:

 

Become a racing god, that’s about it since there was no plot to this game.

 

First Impressions:

 

Damn signs and poles and those stupid cars that side swipe you into those signs and poles. Grrr, stupid trees, and OMG I finally beat a level. That should pretty much sum up how I felt about this game and how difficult it was to actually win a race.

 

22 Years Later:

 

Still as hard with all the turns, cars, poles and such, press the load state buttons many times to try to complete this race. I also forgot about the turbo button and I think it could have help complete the races a bit quicker, thank god for the fast forward button to speed up the game. Still a fun game and actually I beat it this morning for the first time so yeah for me.

 

Overall Ranking:

 

8 because of the low scores, but I be nice and give it a 8.9 just because how challenging it still is after 22 years.

 

Now for that Catchy slogan--

 

"Games don't get old, just people!"

 

--Now for some copyright info--

Images and of course games are copyrighted to its perspective owners blah blah blah. Roms are illegal and so do not get caught blah blah blah or else blah blah blah. Reviews and opinions are my own so don't argue with me unless you can prove otherwise why this game sucks and 100% of the time you are wrong because one your either a new school gamer and don't know a good game when you see it or two, well there is no two so HA!!. All slogans, trademarks and names excluded the games I review are copyrighted to me blah blah and blah. 2007-2009 SM Old School Legend.
Edited January 16, 2009 by Saint_Michael (see edit history)