Review: Daytona USA (Xbox 360) (From Croydon Guardian)

Review: Daytona USA (Xbox 360)

11:35am Thursday 27th October 2011 in Video games By Adam Pettifer

Rooooolling Staaaaaaart!! It’s back – after 17 years, my favourite arcade game of all time has been dusted down, rebuilt and sympathetically restored. Sega have been pretty canny lately at revisiting their old IP and re-issuing it. We have already had Outrun Online (great), Afterburner Climax (great) and recently, Guardian Heroes (great)… All of these were great, worthy updates of wonderful old games and now, the best one of all has been released.

And it’s arcade perfect... Well, better than arcade perfect. Just like the re-release of Perfect Dark on Xbox Live a couple of years ago, the Sega AM Port Team have been careful to make the game look like you remember it, rather than how the arcade machine really looks. This means the visuals have been carefully converted to HD, texture maps have been subtly sharpened and the annoying pop-up in the distance that used to affect the arcade machine (and Saturn version) have been eliminated.

All the original music has been kept and remastered – it’s so, so good to hear the theme tune again, surely the most welcoming sound of any arcade game… I played the original in arcades from Clacton-on-Sea, to the Trocadero, to America – I got to know it pretty well. It had a very unrealistic handling model that still had great depth and was a lot of fun to learn and master. Also, I once visited the Daytona speedway – it looks nothing like this! There’s nothing quite like drifting an old Nascar around turn 3 on the Beginner’s oval course, because it’s the quickest way (so far removed from reality it’s untrue). I actually used to use a glancing blow technique to the barrier – I’d let the car run wide and gently kiss the outside barrier enough to get me round, I could lap in just under 18 secs that way.

All this is in the new game – it feels exactly as I remember it. The hidden fruit machine on the bridge above the track is there, it can still be played while hitting the select button when driving under it. The old techniques still work – like squeezing your opponent out to the outside, into the barrier just right, so that they crash and roll their car.

But on top of that, there’s a host of new features that have been sympathetically added. Wisely, Sega have not added any more tracks, or cars. I didn’t want that – I don’t remember those. What they have done is add great features such as online multiplayer, time trial, survival modes (stage by stage driving against the clock) and best of all – karaoke mode! This is just a chance to drive the tracks as normal, with the lyrics to the cheesy, wonderful soundtrack displayed on screen – encouraging you to sing along! Fantastic.

There are worldwide leaderboards too – after an hour or so of trying on the oval course, I had risen to 272nd fastest in the world, feels good man… All the fastest drivers are using an exploit where you can drive through the pitlane without stopping if you aim just right – but then the arcade machine had that too! It also offers force feedback steering wheel support – so all the sim heads who bought wheels for Forza 4 can get the real arcade machine feeling as the steering wheel bucks and writhes.

This game has got so much heart and soul – it delivers so much, with just one car and three tracks. It’s also a masterclass in how to sympathetically update and improve a dear old favourite game. And It’s available for download for under £7 now on Xbox Live marketplace and the Playstation Network in early November.

So how to score it? Well that depends – were you there in the nineties? Did you play this and love it as I and a whole generation of gamers did? If you weren’t there, I guess this game is worth a 7 or so – it has an unusual handling model, not many tracks and only one car. But I was there – I did love it and this has been joyous to play. And it’s £7! Really – it’s a must, an absolute must buy. Thank you Sega – for putting a smile on this cynical old gamer’s face.

10/10

Daytona USA is out now to download on Xbox Live Marketplace and will be available on Playstation Network in early November.