A racing game with a very impressive sense of speed and some really nice chunky graphics. It reminds me a lot of Micro Machines, which is impressive as RC Pro-Am came out a few years earlier.

The controls get some getting used to as you use left and right to turn. This makes sense in writing but can sometimes be disorientating in the isometric view, where pointing in the direction you want to travel would be more intuitive. Once you get used to it, you’ll be blasting through the tracks.

Dotted along the tracks are missiles, bombs and upgrades. Collecting a missile or bomb will change your whole stock into that type, which can be annoying if you want the other item. Upgrades will speed up your car permanently, and collecting them all slows down the rate the other cars can upgrade, which is important as if you let them upgrade, all of them will be unbeatable.

The game is fairly generous in that you only need to place 3rd (out of 4) to progress. Doing this is still difficult, and sometimes getting first place is an impossibility as the AI racers can outright cheat, zooming ahead while you’re at the highest possible speed in the game. Luckily they don’t use weapons against you. In the last race, I had around 80 bombs, so I used them every time an opponent came close. Due to the AI cheating, I ended up using around 70 of these in this one race alone to keep them at bay.
Still, as 3rd place is the main requirement, RC Pro-Am is still a fun racing game due to its sense of speed.

Completion is getting 3rd or better on all tracks, then the snapshots. The ones for RC Pro-Am have been the hardest so far, with one where you have to hit 5 opponents with missiles (the east part) and then win the race (which is mainly hoping you get lucky with the AI), and one where you start more than a lap behind, where you need to complete 9 perfect laps without touching the sides or slowing down to catch up and win.

Well, we have seen Rare try their hand at platformers, 2D or isometric, beat-’em-ups, space shooters, and “adventure” games. Some of them have been good, while most of them I just rather not look at again for the rest of my life. But, with all that said, how about what they have done for the racing genre? Since they liked making games with isometric perspectives, as well as some of the most wild, jank-ass control schemes for the NES, it seems like a racing game would be a natural success for them when combining those elements with the genre. And as seen with today’s subject, R.C. Pro-Am, turns out I am right, because not only did this game sell over 2 million copies back in the day, but it also still holds up extremely well. This is actually a pretty damn good racing game from Rare, and probably my favorite racing game that I have played on the NES so far (even though I haven’t really played that many from this system). Yes, it’s not perfect, and it can get pretty wonky at points, but for what we have here, this is a pretty great time, and I wouldn’t mind checking this out again later down the road.

The graphics are pretty simplistic, nothing too impressive for the system, but considering how fast the game goes, that is probably for the best, the music, for the most part, is nonexistent, with the game mainly just using “realistic” noises for the races, which kind of sucks, but for the few music tracks that are there, they hold up pretty well, the control is pretty good, although it does have some of that early Rare jankiness which I will go more into later, and the gameplay is pretty fun, chaotic, and replayable, despite its flaws.

The game is a top-down isometric racing game, where you take control of one of 4 RC cars, race through many different tracks, avoid obstacles and defeat your opponents, gather plenty of upgrades and weapons to keep an edge throughout all the races, and make sure that you don’t end up in last place, or else you get eliminated. For the most part, it is what you would expect for a racing game, but it is actually pretty fun, having the proper speed, proper adrenaline, and the proper pacing that is needed to make a pretty entertaining racing experience. Not to mention, for the time it came out, it did quite a bit for the genre.

Most racing games at this point in time were just all about getting from Point A to Point B, and yes, that is still the primary objective here, but there is a little more to it rather than just driving faster than others. Here, you can actually use weapons in order to take out your opponents, such as with bombs that you can leave behind you, or arrows that you shoot from the front, and you can use these weapons to get the upper hand in plenty of situations. It is utilized spectacularly in this game, and this mechanic would go on to influence plenty of other racing games in the next few years, such as Super Mario Kart. Not to mention, there is also a mechanic where you have to gather parts on the tracks to upgrade your own car so you can go as fast and turn as well for the upcoming tracks, and I REALLY liked this mechanic. Sure, it may be hard to get a handle of, and you do get your upgrades taken away after a certain amount of races, which does kind of suck, but at the same time, it allows the player to feel like you are progressing towards something, and it helps you get an upper hand over your opponents.

And yet, this game still has its problems, with the first one being that controlling your car can get pretty chaotic at times. It isn’t that hard, but there were plenty of times when I was playing where I would swerve into danger, crash into something, or barely be able to make a turn because of the speed. For the most part, it is manageable, and it is still fun, but there is a bit of a learning curve, especially later on. And speaking of later on, the other problem that the game has is that it overstays its welcome. There are a total of 32 courses that you race on before beating the game (technically 24, because after that one, they just start repeating tracks), and while they aren’t that big, and don’t take much time to clear at all, there is barely any difference between any of the tracks aside from the shape, length, and obstacles. It does get tiresome after a bit, which is why I decided to stop after beating Track 24 rather then going all the way to the end, because why would I if I am just gonna be replaying tracks I have already beaten? Not to mention, the opponents get pretty damn aggressive at this point of the game, so if I did continue, I would probably end up regretting that decision immensely.

Overall, while not the most creative of racing games in terms of its tracks, and while it is definitely outshined by other games in the genre, R.C. Pro-Am was a pretty good game for being an NES racer, and one that I may want to go back to at some point whenever I got nothing better to do, and I don’t say that a lot about Rare’s oldest titles. I would recommend it for those who wanna see what racing games were like before we got games like F-Zero and Mario Kart. Oh yeah, by the way, before anyone asks, yes, I am aware of the Genesis version of this game, which apparently changes some things around from this version, but… I don’t give a shit about that, really.

Game #290

Simple, fast-paced, and intuitively designed, giving you ample time to respond to incoming turns. It's also nice to see David Wise's name on a game this early on. But it offers little value after the first 10-15 minutes of gameplay. I feel it would've been better suited as an on-the-go Gameboy title. Coincidentally, there does exist a Pro-Am game on the Gameboy, so it looks like my wish was fulfilled! In any case, unless you're in the middle of a Rare marathon, you're not missing out on much here.

It's fun for a while and has a lot of ups and downs. The graphics are impressive for 87. Would have rather had music than car hums since the game has to choose. You can drift past someone into first which is incredibly cool, but if you crash from an oil slick you reset in a random direction, not to mention they can sometimes sprite flicker meaning you can't see them. You have access to cool items, but the AI can achieve Ludicrous Speed.

Now I know what you're asking: If the AI can Ludicrous Speed and get out of the range of your items, doesn't that make your items practically useless once they are out of sight? Well, YES!

Extra shoutouts to Track 24 where not only are there no items on the track (beyond the NINTENDO letter which if you get all upgrades your car) but if you started in 3rd with the bomb weapon, is literally impossible.

RC Pro-Am (NES version) is pretty good fun. Simply race and don't get last place, otherwise I assume you get tossed into the sarlacc pit or something. It's never mentioned how the universe of RC Pro-Am works.

The actual driving is fun, but it sucks that it doesn't take long for Rugal from King of Fighters to suddenly take the wheel of all the CPU cars and constantly rubberband on your ass, with victory basically hinging on whether you have enough rockets to blast those assholes as they attempt to overtake you at ludicrous speed. The later tracks also absolutely fucking love oil slicks, they can't get enough of them! Well I don't! They're worse than the CPU racers! My favorite obstacle is the Wile E. Coyote steel wall that launches out of the ground, I can't imagine the type of bloodthirsty RC league that uses that kind of dastardly shit. These guys are hardcore.

Either way, the game is still fun and I'm definitely pulling my punches out of sheer nostalgia, so please excuse the extra half-star that probably doesn't need to be there. I think it's a true mark of how good David Wise is as a composer when even the little jingles he made for this game are some of my most memorable sounds from this era, or once again it might be my nostalgia too. Who knows anymore.

My first game that wasn't SMB1 or Duck Hunt maybe.

R.C. Pro-Am is probably more fun if you play it with other people, because by yourself, it's kinda just a big-old "alright".

It took me a bit to get adjusted to not just the controls, but also the perspective that this game is at.
After I did, I realized that many of the courses look too much like each other, and considering its arcade-like design, there is no ending, you just play until you get a game over.

That's fine and all, but besides the upgrade system, which is a cool idea, there's not much more to this game.

Good to pop in every once in a while for mindless fun.

Game # 67 of my challenge

This is my first racing game on my list and let me tell you, it's a really hard one. This is also the 4th game of Rare, one iconic game company of the 90s

First of all, there are not much plot to this game. It's a racing game and your goal is to be first. However, you are not driving any cars. You are remotely controller an RC cart. That's the only premise of this game.

The visual of this game looks really good. The game is viewed in a isometric view during the race. The bright colors makes the game looks really good. It's also really simple, but it works. You can see and identify what's on the race track. The UI is also great because they integrated the map in the bottom of the screen, which helps a lot to know when there's some turns. The Music is also really great. The starting screen is really a banger.

The controls are also really simple : Control with the D-pad, B to accelerate and A to horn (you won't really use it). However, controlling the RC is really hard. Since you are in an Isometric view, it's not always obvious on where to go when you don't know. Also, turning is really hard. This car turn so abruptly it's insane. The hit detection of the cart is also really big, so it's difficult to avoid everything.

The gameplay is pretty simple, but clever. You have some basics car stats and during your races, you can collect stuff to improve your car (like turning, acceleration and max speed). This improvements will stay for several races. This makes the game really enjoyable, since you want to get first, but also collect all the stats to help you in other races. There are also other stuff that you can collect : Frames, missiles, bombs and ammo. You read me well, you can shoot missile in this game to other cars using your horn button, but it's hard to aim them. There are also a lot of obstacles to avoid on the track that will slow you down or simply make you crash.

There's one thing that really infuriated me is that if you get last in a track, you are game over. There's no retry and you start at the beginning. This is really stupid since all the races are really short and sweet. Sometimes, a single mistake will give you a game over and you need to start all over. Also, the rubber banding in this game is crazy. They can crash and catch you right after in the next 5 seconds, but you can't do that, especially when you crash, you will sometimes start backwards. So you need to turn around your car and that makes it difficult to catch them.

Even though this game is really charming, I cannot give higher than a 3 stars to the 4th game created by Rare studios. I know they will have better game in the future.

Pros: The isometric view of the track is kind of fun, different, feels like you're really controlling little RC cars. The power-ups and obstacles are also a fun way to mix things up, and it's really satisfying any time you get a speed boost on stage. Nice title screen music too, of course, this is Rare in the NES era! I also dig the controls, tank style, which some may not be fond of, especially of the era, but they're my preferred style of play control for games like this, such as Top Ride mode in Kirby Air Ride.

Cons: Single player only? Oh well, the sequels fixed that anyhow... But a game like this not being multiplayer is a huge hit against it, this type of stuff only being single player is a major bummer, so it gets docked a lot from that alone.

What it means to me: Y'know, not much, this game was one of those garage sale finds later in life, and me being such a Rare fan, I had to give it a shot. And it's pretty solid, I don't really have much else in terms of connection to this one, other than it being an NES game on the fun side of things.

It's difficult not to see Rare's early titles as reinterpretations of earlier titles, hence the jack-of-all-trades nature of the studio until the early 1990s, the release of Donkey Kong Country (1994) and the close collaboration with Nintendo. Prior to this period, they were experimenting with multiple concepts and R.C. Pro-Am is a prime example of this. While it was probably one of the first games to feature remote control cars, the title shares a striking similarity with Super Sprint (1986), as it already featured all of the characteristic elements of R.C. Pro-Am, with the exception of the isometric view which replaced the overhead view.

The player controls a small car over several tracks and races against several opponents. As in Super Sprint, several upgrades are scattered along the road, increasing the steering, acceleration and speed of the vehicle. In addition to these items, the player must avoid a number of obstacles and try to collect letters to spell 'NINTENDO'. Each race has one single letter, meaning that the word can only be formed after the eighth race. When the condition is met, the player will swap their car for a faster, but harder to control model, while keeping the previously increased stats. Opponents also benefit from the car swap, thereby increasing the difficulty of the game.

In contrast to the typical racing games of this period, R.C. Pro-Am can be surprisingly slippery. The high speed and wide curves require the player to approach the curves with finesse and it is not always easy to drift as one would like. Every mistake benefits the opponents, who sometimes have much faster vehicles than the player. To compensate for this disadvantage, projectiles can be fired to temporarily destroy the competitors. Two weapons are available, depending on the bonus items collected on the road: the missile allows to attack forwards, while the bomb strikes behind. The problem is that, in the vast majority of cases, the missile is the only effective weapon. Inadvertently picking up a bomb on a course can cause problems later, for example in stage 8, where the blue vehicle has a grotesquely high top speed.

R.C. Pro-Am, while not a complex game, compiles several interesting ideas and offers a challenge unlike the traditional NES racing games. This freshness explains the very positive reception the game gained at the time, but one can regret the repetitiveness of the courses, after a certain point. Unlike Super Sprint and other arcade games, the track never intersects itself, an idea that could have been clever, given the shortness of the track and the presence of other vehicles, propitious to the childlike chaos that these remote-controlled cars represent. The absence of music while racing also gives the game a very eerie feel, probably not intended by Rare. Anyway, the game is a real curiosity that can easily be played in 2022.