[Review] OutRun

REVIEW # 00000000 00011110

69.2 Magical Sound Shower

OutRun is one of the best selling game of all time and won the Golden Joystick Award for Game of the Year. Is the game that defined the difference between a Racing game and Driving game even if some titles released later still confused the two genres (like Test Drive, for example) and hase been widely acclaimed as one of the 100 most important titles in video game history.

My heart says…

The MS-DOS version of OutRun was one of the first game I ever played on my first computer, a woderful 286. At that time was already an old game, since I played in 1994, 8 years after the first release but I still remember the arcade version that dominate in my grand-grandma bar, smashed everyday by swarm of teenager willing to fight for the highest score.

Then there was a Ferrari, a blonde chick sitting next to you and sun, a lot of sun. Who could ask for more?

Splash screen

The wonderful intro with the Ferrari ready to start the engine on a sunny californian (maybe) road with a summer tune in the background it’s a piece of gaming history. Good beginning for SEGA…

Graphics

The main feature of OutRun is the game engine, especially fot its detail and fluidity, then we have the bright colors that were perfect for the context, a sunny american coast, and Ferrari shiny red shade. To be 1986 is definitelu not bad even if the car sprites are quite repetitive.

Narrative

If there was a plot surely it could be like “my blonde fiancee want me to go with her on the sunny west coast streets just to make sure everybody could see her on a Ferrari”. But I’m not really sure this was the intention of the developers…

Gameplay

The gameplay id quite simple, maybe TOO simple. You have to drive your car on a road race, trying to avoid the traffic and to go out of the track and you have a limited amount of time, that can be increased every checkpoint.

Your car is 2-gear Ferrari (gear “Low” and gear “High”…) and sometimes you will face a pitchfork whee you have to choose left or right: every direction leads you to one of the five different finish lines each one with a particular ending scene (those are quite funny though).

There’s nothing particular you have to do if not be aware of the other cars so the game is only a race against the time that can be translated in a race against the high score, since every second you save at the end of the race is converted in points.

Ok, we are in an arcade game, but maybe with something more to do this could have been a way better experience.

Sound

Here comes the best part of the game. The music you have to choose at the beginning of the game, moving the radio tuner (this was a wonderul idea) are awesome and make you really feel as you are driving a Ferrari in the sunny street on the West Coast.

Longevity

Despite my love fot OutRun we have to say that the longevity is not a key point of the game. There are 5 different game endings but the game is quite repetitive. There are other features that made this game great…

Final Score 71/100

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Year: 1986

Developer: Sega AM2

Publisher: Sega

Genre: Racing

Games Mode: Single Player, Multiplayer

Original Platform: Arcade, ported on Amiga, Amstrad CPC Atari ST, Commodore 64, MS-DOS, Game Gear, Genesis, MSX, SEGA Master System, SEGA Saturn, TurboGrafx-16, ZX Spectrum

From same developers:

• Space Harrier (1985)
• Afterburner (1987)
• Virtua Fighter (1993) and sequels
• Virtua Cop (1994) and sequels
• Virtua Striker (1994) and sequels

From the same publishers:

• Alex Kidd in Miracle World (1986) and sequels
• Altered Beast (1988)
• Golden Axe (1989)
• Sonic the Hedgedog (1991) and sequels

Inspired to:

• Hang-On (1985)

If you liked you can also try:

• OutRun Europe (1991)
• OutRun 2019 (1993)
• Ferrari F355 Challenge (1999)

Other chapters of the saga:

• Turbo OutRun (1989)
• OutRunners (1992)
• OutRun 2 (2003)

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