Old School, Baby!

[Fish_Flake]

All those "Formula One Decade" programs on Speed made me wanting some old school racing action. For me, of course, the one thing that got me into Formula One to begin with was "Nigel Mansell's World Championship" on the old SNES. But that was a drag, because you could only play as Mansell and by the time the game was out, Nigel was here in America doing the Indycar thing, and when they came out with "Nigel Mansell/Newman-Haas Indycar Racing," he was driving in Formula One again. So, I went on the black market looking for another old 16-bit classic: "F-1 Pole Position." I found something even better: "F-1 Pole Position II," the only game I could find based on the 1993 season which I have been watching. Of course, the only setback in those games back then was that I could never be Ayrton Senna, since all I had back then was an SNES, and he had a licensing deal with Sega, which he oddly enough slandered throughout the 1993 season, putting a squashed hedgehog decal on his car every time he won. This game was the same, and so I was stuck driving as Mika Hakkinen.

[Fish_Flake]

But wait! The game had a create-a-driver mode where you could make up a name, give him a nationality, a birthday, and a face. I inserted "A.Senna," chose Brazil for the nationality, and found his birthdate. Then, much to my luck, the programmers had already thought ahead when they drew the faces. I wonder who that first guy is? Surely he is ficticious and is not related to the FIA F1 World Championship and their correlated organizations and facilities!

[Fish_Flake]

While I was at it, I found a custom engine contract mode. I took the liberty to trade in that wussy Ford V8 for an older model with more power.

[Fish_Flake]

Finally, success, and a beautiful pairing, if I must say so myself.

[pirenzo]

And now some racing action please!!!

Edited to remove the 4 lines of 's

[Fish_Flake]

I'll get to it. It's hard to take screenshots when you're driving with your controller and the screenshot button's on the keyboard.

[Fish_Flake]

I must say that it is mind-boggling to see how far console gaming has come in the past ten years, especially in racing games. Look at this screenshot here. The car is a Tyrrell, and the circuit is Estoril, but there's no way you can tell that. The land is flat, there is no scenery whatsoever, and the car is virtually unrecognizable. To think that this was the best F1 simulation available on a console is almost funny now. The better points of the game can't be seen here, such as the pseudo-3D Mode 7 engine, and that the engine sounds are true to life compared to the awkward humming of most other games, but it's still ridiculously primitive compared to what we have now. In fact, I own a game for Game Boy Advance (F1 2002) that blows this game away.

[ASCII Man]

Whoah, custom engine stuff.

I'm gonna look if they don't have this on abandonware!

[Aysedasi]

Great stuff

I remember buying my kids a Sega Megadrive for Xmas. I bought it some time in the November with the Senna Monaco GP game. I'd polayed it in secret about 50 times before they opened the wrapping! I remember the day when I first beat Senna for the championship. He gets out of his car and comes across to shake your hand......

[Down F0rce]

Is it just me, or does the face at the end of the first row on that "make a driver" screenshot look like Keke Rosberg?

[Fish_Flake]

Here is the starting grid at Donington in the rain. You think the real conditions of the 1993 European GP were treacherous, look at this. This shot has not been altered!!

[Fish_Flake]

I was, of course, driving as Senna, trying to recreate his magic lap. I started dead last on the grid, 14th place...

[Fish_Flake]

...And by the end of the first lap, moved all the way to second place, behind Nigel Mansell (who came in the game as a reserve driver, and whom I substituted for Damon Hill). How did I make up all that ground? I'm not going to act like a big shot, it is just a case of terrible 16-bit AI. (The chicane can easily be taken full-blast, but the computer still brakes to about 100 km/h, which meant about seven positions.)

[Fish_Flake]

Despite all of the Williams' drivers' lowbrow attempts to keep me from the lead (I passed Mansell in the Old Hairpin at lap 2, then was punted off the track on the exit, a move he tried again the next lap which resulted in him dropping far back. Prost then got into the back of me at Melbourne in laps 3 and 4, which only caused him to finish 4th), I took an easy victory.

To clarify, I started dead last in 14th, not because I opted for a smaller grid but because there are only 14 cars in the game: 2 cars each for Williams, McLaren, Benetton, Ferrari, Footwork, Tyrrell, and Sauber. Even though there are no Minardis, Jordans, Ligiers, Lotuses, or Larrousses, the game is better than the others of the time, because of the fact that each team in the game have two drivers, and in my opinion, it is much better to have Ricardo Patrese or Gerhard Berger than Eric Comas.

[Lee Janotta]

I've been playing around with it too. I put Mansell into Katayama's Tyrrel, and gave Ken's team the Cossies that McLaren wouldn't be using. He goes out and qualifies and finishes second in the first round.

It's impossible to qualify anyplace but dead last with this game, but yeah, you can can pass pretty easily.

But good lord, Interlagos feels _so_ weird without the hills!

[pirenzo]

That guy does look like Keke doesn't he? And the one below martin Brundle?

Doesn't Donnny feel odd without the hills too?

[alesi95]

the one bellow senna looks like Michael Andretti.

[Fish_Flake]

Going back to where it all began for me: "Nigel Mansell's World Championship." Here I am blatantly ignoring Nige's advice on how fast to take the Esses in Mexico City:

[Fish_Flake]

Here's my report card. Taking the Esses at 50 km/h over the suggested speed cost me in the grading process, even though it cut at least 10 seconds off my time.