It's a genuine marvel that this game even exists on the mega drive, let alone in the actual state it released in. All 3 tracks from the arcade game are present, the control feels roughly on par with the arcade version (though the D-pad not being analog definitely makes the game feel really stiff to control and tapping the directions constantly is the name of the game for good steering for some reason), and the entire thing not only renders more polygons than your typical "super-FX" fare, but also runs at a rather comparatively high 15 FPS! Playing this on a Nomad kind of mitigates some of the low framerate problems due to the slow screen refresh rate, though it does make cars in the distance hard to see. It really does feel kind of like an early 32-bit game, yet it's running on a cartridge on a mega drive. Sasuga SVP.

How come the medium course is harder than the expert course???

Throughout the 90s, there would be many experiments that would pop up from time to time to see how far developers can expand the world of video games. There have been experiments that were much more simple, such as games that would combine multiple genres together just to see what new type of fun could be made, and then there are experiments that would be a lot more extreme, such as the ungodly abomination known as the Virtual Boy, which we all still love to remember and make fun of to this very day. Undeniably though, the biggest and most successful experiment being the transition of games from 2D to 3D, and there have been many different examples of this, not just with certain games, but even with franchises transitioning into 3D. One of the earliest examples of 3D gaming would come from the Virtua games, which were a bunch of sub-series from Sega that were meant to take familiar genres of the time and put them in the third dimension, with some of the most notable examples of this being with the Virtua Fighter series. However, before that series or any of the others, there was one game that started this whole Virtua trend, and that would be Virtua Racing.

Upon hearing about this game and looking at some screenshots, you can pretty much tell exactly what you are going to get from this game. It is basically gonna be like your typical racer of the era, but now it is in 3D, which isn’t as bad as you may think it would be. This was released back in 1992, back when 3D graphics in games were still in some of their most primitive phases, so seeing anything like this at the time was pretty impressive, but obviously, there are much better options that have come out for 3D racers ever since. With that said, I did want to try the game out to see how it has aged after 30+ years, and yeah, I can certainly say that this is indeed one of the very first 3D racing games. It gives you pretty much exactly what you would expect, but it can be pretty fun when you are giving it a go, and it won’t waste your time either.

The graphics are very impressive for the time, even though nowadays it looks like complete shit, but I can imagine if I was alive back around this time, and I saw this in an arcade, my mind would have been blown by it, the music is pretty good, with there being several tracks that will get you pumped up to make your competitors eat your dust, even if a lot of the time the game chooses to have no music, the control is pretty damn responsive, which I thought wasn’t gonna be all that good for a racer like this, but it responded well enough a lot of the time, and the gameplay is about what you would expect, but it can still be fun for the short time you have with it.

The game is your typical racing game, where you take control of a racer, take on one of three tracks, race alongside 15 other opponents and do your best to outrun them, and make sure to do all this before the timer runs out. And……… that is about it. Yes, it is a VERY simple racer, and one that will definitely not last you long at all, which can be seen as a pretty bad thing by plenty, and yeah, I definitely wouldn’t choose to go back to this one if I ever wanted to revisit any old-school racers. However, in the case of Virtua Racing, the fact that there is very little content was probably for the best, as having a lot of content was not the goal of this game.

Obviously, the main focus of the entire game is on the polygonal graphics, which are, again, very impressive for the time, and they definitely show off how far technology had come at that point in time. Of course though, nowadays, it is all just slanty garbage, coupled with a bunch of 3D humans that look like they want to kill me in my sleep, but it is all still nice to look at, and it runs very smoothly, especially with all the things that are being shown at once. Not to mention, there is a little more that can be done with the game to make it more exciting. The main racing itself is pretty good already, giving you that great sense of speed that is essential in a racer, and it does feel very satisfying to successfully turn a pretty tight corner, especially in the expert course of the game. But, if you wanna take it even further, you can play this game with up to 8 players, which is something I’m not sure how you could manage, since who the hell wants to play Virtua Racing with up to 8 people, but if you can get that many to race with you, it is sure to be a great time.

But of course, at the end of the day, it is still a very basic racer. The game will only last you around 20 minutes or so if you are just wanting to do one run through all of the tracks, and there isn’t much else there in comparison to many other racers out there. There are other versions of the game out there released for Sega consoles that did introduce new things, based on what I have briefly researched, but really, if you aren’t that big into the racing genre, none of it is really gonna convince you to stop everything that you are doing to immediately try the game out. That being said though, for being one of the first polygonal 3D racing games out there, it is still very impressive just seeing what they managed to get away with at the time, and even playing it, you can have a pretty good time with it, even with the right people.

Overall, despite a lack of originality and content, Virtua Racing is a major feat when it comes to racing games for the time, and it is a good title to give a shot when you have nothing better to do. I would recommend it for racing fans, as well as those who are familiar with Sega’s other Virtua games that they made after this, but for everyone else, there are plenty of better options to be found in the genre. Now if you excuse me, I must go on a quest to find seven people that are willing to face me in an 8-player race of this game. It may be difficult, but I swear there must be people out there willing to try it.

Game #371

Lethal Enforcers Wiki:

1. Early Life
2. Plot
- 2.1 Controversy
- 2.2 Racism
- 2.3 The Konami chinese strike of 1993
- 2.4 Attempted resurrection of Mao Tsé-Tung
3. Death