The 1980s were over and times were changing. Home consoles were becoming powerful enough to compete with classic sprite-based arcade games. It was time for arcade developers to start pushing the envelope harder than they had ever pushed it before. 3D gaming was the future, but the technology was still in its infancy. Home computers and consoles wouldn’t be able to handle true 3D until halfway through the decade and wouldn’t be able to do it well until near the end. It was up to arcade developers alone to pioneer this new technology, since they were the only ones who could afford to. Many gamers today take for granted just how big of a deal arcades were in the development of 3D rendering.
Daytona USA (1993) – Sega AM2
When Sega’s 1992 Model 1 arcade board (the one used for Virtua Racing) turned out not to be very cost efficient, it was time for an upgrade. The technology used in it was originally used in a government flight simulator. Yu Suzuki, head of the AM2 branch of Sega, somehow managed to talk Sega into shelling out the 2 million dollars for the rights to use the technology. It paid off on their end, since Daytona USA, the arcade board’s debut game, was the second video game ever to use texture mapping (the first was Ridge Racer, which didn’t do it nearly as well). For those who don’t understand what that means, texture mapping is what allows polygons in 3D games to be more than colored boxes. Daytona USA graphically blew away everything else available at the time.
Daytona USA really, really built Virtua Racer’s minor drifting mechanics into the full-blown drifting system that Sega’s racing games would come to be known for. The car’s four gears aren’t just for show: they offer lots and lots of options when you take a corner. You can downshift into third momentarily to give your car a bit more turning power. If that’s not enough, you can shift straight down to first or second gear to give your car a LOT more turning power. From there, you can choose to shift straight back into fourth or go into third to steady your car before locking back into fourth. There’s also an option to brake drift if you don’t feel like messing with the gear shift. Another interesting gameplay addition is that your car will become progressively more beat up as you crash, forcing you to visit a pit stop in order to regain your normal handling.
But the new physics weren’t the only thing this game had going for it. The AI difficulty would scale to the player’s skill level, which was pretty advanced for a racing game at the time. If you wanted to play against humans instead of these computer players, this was also the first arcade game to support linking up to 8 individual cabinets for multiplayer. It’s pretty easy to see why this game is still so prominent at arcades nearly 25 years after its release. It had so much longevity, in fact, that in 2009 Sega re-released this arcade game in HD as “Sega Racing Classic” (they no longer had the license to the Daytona name, so all references were removed). Other than having a higher resolution, the game is otherwise completely untouched, blocky polygons and all.
Cruis’n USA (1994) – Midway Games
Midway Games were a very significant arcade publisher in the 90s. They were a western-based company, so that they had a much better understanding of the western arcade scene than Namco, Capcom, Konami, Sega, or any of the other Japan-based developers at the time. Many Japanese arcade games were highly technical and difficult to master, while Midway instead opted for a different approach that would click better with western audiences: Easier mechanics, more gore, lots of Easter eggs, and their trademark wacky since of humor.
In 1994, Nintendo wanted to showcase their upcoming home console: Project Reality (better known as the “Nintendo 64” these days). Since Nintendo had long been out of the arcade buisiness, they enlisted the help of Midway Games and Rare to create a pair of games that would show arcade-goers the power of the upcoming system (Cruis’n USA and Killer Instinct, respectively). Except, as it turned out, Nintendo didn’t actually give them anything related to the N64 hardware to work with, so the games ultimately had nothing to do with the Nintendo 64. Nobody knows what Nintendo was thinking with that stunt, but it sparked the beginning of one of the most well-known arcade racing series.
Cruis’n USA draws heavily from Out Run. The most obvious comparison, aside from both games having adjustable radio stations, is the amount of emphasis on the track variety. Cruis’n USA had a whopping 14 selectable tracks, compared to the standard three or four tracks most games of the time period had. The game also gives you the option to play every course in succession, starting with California and making your way to Washington DC. Your ultimate reward is sharing a hot tub on top of the White House with Bill Clinton and a bunch of half-dressed women. Also like Out Run, the game was quite open with its sense of humor.
As far as the gameplay goes, this one leaves a lot to be desired. This game was meant for a much more casual audience than Sega’s games were targeted at. There are no real advanced driving techniques other than tapping the break to drift. Instead, winning the race usually comes down to avoiding swarms of oncoming traffic. This is the game’s main shortcoming. It’s pretty common to reach the top of a hill, only to find yourself crashing directly into a car that was coming up the other side. The enemy cars also have a bad habit of crashing, blocking the road in front of you. You’ll often feel you’ve lost a race due to something beyond your control, even when the computer cars aren’t blatantly cheating in the final stretch.
Sega Rally Championship 1995 (1994) – SEGA AM3
With the advent of the Sega Model 2 board, technology had finally advanced to the point where developers could do things with the racing genre that they could only have dreamed of a few years prior. When it came time to release their second racing game on the hardware, Sega’s AM3 team knew they couldn’t just rehash Daytona USA. They needed something new and different. That’s when they turned their sights toward rallying.
Like nearly every other racer of the time, you start the game in last place and only advance by finding and passing enemy cars. The game puts an interesting spin on it by making it impossible to pass enough cars to get first place on a single track. Instead, your position carries over into the next race, so you’re forced to slowly climb your way through the ranks over the course of three stages. For those who’ve mastered the game enough to finish the final race in first place, there’s a hidden fourth stage waiting as a reward.
Like you’d expect from a game revolving around rally racing, Sega Rally Championship has a much more off-road feel to it than Daytona USA. Instead of a clean race track, you’ll find yourself racing through much more backwater areas like woods and mountains. This is what inspired the game’s most noteworthy feature: It was the very first 3D racing game to feature alternative terrain types to navigate through. Sure, games had made it harder to drive when you leave the course before, but this game would often switch out the main track for mud or gravel sections. In order to fully master this game, a player would need to quickly adjust to vast differences in handling on different parts of the same track. Even the game’s physics were built to take full advantage of this gimmick, opting to make them less realistic to emphasize the change in controls. Even the slightest turn will send the back of your car wildly fishtailing around, especially on mud.
Sega Rally would go on to have a few console-exclusive sequels and two, far rarer, arcade follow-ups. Although the series never really took off as in the same way Daytona did, director Kenji Sasaki’s experience with this game would eventually pay off in a big way. Take a look at the game’s attract mode and see if it reminds you of anything…
For those wondering what the deal with “Sega AM2” and “Sega AM5” are, they’re short for “Sega Amusement Machine Research and Development Team Division”. Sega had six separate arcade development teams at the time: AM1, a set of general developers. AM2, who were behind the Virtua series and most racing games. AM3, who mostly did shooting games. AM4 were a support team that helped the other divisions when they were shorthanded. AM5, a fairly small branch that mainly did work for Sega Japan’s theme park-esque attractions. And finally AM6, who mainly worked in ticket games. There were also a few other AMs, such as AM11 and AM12, but they were mostly short-lived.
Also note that people often get these branches mixed up. I’ve very frequently seen Sega Rally Championship mis-attributed to AM5. The reason seems to be because they’re all citing System16’s page about the Sega development branches, which mistakenly assumes that the post-reshuffling branches were just renamed versions of the classic branches. Since the director of this game was later moved to Sega Rosso, the page thus assumes that he was in AM5 while working on it. Please stop using that page as a source. It doesn’t know what it’s talking about.
Sega Super GT (1996) – SEGA AM2
Sega Super GT Plus (1997) – SEGA AM2
Just a few short years after Sega’s revolutionary Model 2 arcade board, it was time for Sega to push the envelope even further than was ever believed possible with their new Model 3 arcade board. This behemoth was easily the most powerful powerful arcade board on the market at the time of its release. To put this into perspective, high-end home computers were still two years away from matching even the Model 2’s graphical power. The Sega Dreamcast was still years away from release, but this piece of 1996 hardware could easily rival it. Heck, an update to this board released in 1997 (the Model 3 Step 2.0) was hand-down more powerful than the Dreamcast could ever hope to be. Imagine what it felt like seeing something like this hit the arcade scene the same year that home console gamers were being blown away by the Nintendo 64. Naturally, Sega needed a game that could really showcase how much of a graphical leap it was. Since the Model 2 board debuted with Daytona USA, Sega saw it fitting that a similar game would be used to demonstrate the power of its successor. Thus, Sega Super GT was born!
This game really went all-out with showcasing the leap in graphics. Gone are simple environments where you can count the polygons. In their place are detailed, colorful settings that are still beautiful to look at despite their age. The first stage alone has buildings reflecting the sky off their windows, an underwater tunnel showing off the new lighting effects, and even an alternate nighttime option. The scenery whizzing by makes the game feel really fast-passed, even though the game itself isn’t that much faster than Daytona USA. Presentation can do a lot for a game.
Sega Super GT (better known as “SCUD Race” in some regions) is based on the now-defunct BPR Global GT Series race rather than the Daytona 500, but the overall similarities to Daytona USA are less-than-subtle. The games run on the same engine, even having nearly identical UIs, leaving many who think that this game feels more like a Daytona USA sequel than the actual Daytona USA sequel. There was one, big difference that really changed how the game was played: The new Acceleration Drift.
Drifting in racing games up until this point usually consisted entirely of tapping the break or shifting gears during a turn to give yourself tighter control for a few seconds. This game takes that a step further and adds a new layer of complexity to drifting that completely changes how the game is played. Now when you tap the brake pedal mid-turn, you can opt not to step back on the accelerator right away. Drifting this way gives your car more swing, but forces you to restablize it by easing back onto the gas pedal at the right time. If you fail to restabilize your car, prepare to spin-out (although strangely, it’s sometimes possible to keep driving out of a spin-out without losing much speed).
Most casual players will probably never notice the huge changes to the gameplay mechanics, but it’s easy to see why this one still has such a large cult following among hardcore racing fans. Even casual fans have something to appreciate with the game’s beautiful presentation. Despite this, Sega Super GT would never get a home port or sequel. The closest thing it got was a Japan-exclusive update that added several new features, including a new course where you play in a giant child’s playroom and can choose to replace your car with several silly alternatives such a cat or tank. In the end, it was doomed to forever remain a cult classic.
Cruis’n World (1996) – Midway Games
It’s fairly common for arcade racing games to get “sequels” that are simply the base game with some minor content additions like a few new tracks or cars. Sometimes they have the decency to call it “Sega Super GT Plus”, while other times they’ll try to advertise the update as a full-on sequel like “Super Mario Kart GP 2”. For the sake of this article, I’ve been counting these as part of the main game rather than try to write several paragraphs about whatever two new tracks were added. Sometimes I’ll run into a game that I’m not sure whether to classify as a sequel or update.
Cruis’n World is an example of a game that just barely has enough content to qualify as a sequel. For the most part, the gameplay is identical to the original outside of a new trick system that gives you a small bonus for things like double-tapping the gas pedal while launching in the air. However, every single track in the original game has been completely replaced with 14 all-new tracks to suit the new globetrotting theme. Given that 14 tracks was already a ridiculous amount when Cruis’n USA did it, you’ve got to give them credit for the encore. Of course, the differences between the tracks are mainly visual, since very few of them have particularly memorable track layouts or gimmicks that affect gameplay. You do get to kill zebra instead of deer in the Africa stage.
The only other really noteworthy change is the ability to change the color of any of the playable cars. The tradeoff for this feature is that most of the joke vehicles from the first game, such as the police car and school bus, were completely removed. There must have been quite an outcry against that, since the Nintendo 64 port restores all of them alongside many far more ridiculous options. Otherwise, this game is just Cruis’n World with different tracks and four-player support.
San Francisco Rush (1996) – Atari Games
San Francisco Rush: The Rock (1997) – Atari Games
Atari was no stranger to the 3D racing genre, having been an early pioneer in the late 80s. With the genre’s resurgence in the 90s, they decided it was finally time to throw their hats back in the genre. Much like Midway’s Cruis’n games, Atari made it a point to focus on being easy to play rather than the complexity of the racing mechanics. However, San Francisco Rush found a way to really differentiate itself by taking full advantage of 3D courses in a way that no other racer at the time had done.
If you thought Cruis’n had exaggerated physics, wait until you see this game’s complete disregard for gravity. Going up a hill, no matter how small, will usually send you flying through the air. What it lacks in realism it makes for in sheer fun. What really makes it great is that the moon gravity isn’t just there for the entertainment of watching your car fly around like a football page: The game’s stages take full advantage of this mechanic.
What really makes this game unique is the wide array of hidden shortcuts. Shortcuts and alternate routes are nothing new to racing games, but up until this point few had really run with the idea like this. For example, in one track you can access a hidden route by driving under a parked, oversized semi-truck. Behind the truck is a ramp that launches you on top of a nearby building that you can fly off to get back onto the track. Staying airborne for an extended period of time like this gives you a speed boost when you reach the ground again. Shortcuts like these make the environment feel so much more fleshed-out and exploitable than other racers of the time. You’ll find yourself keeping a close eye on the scenery at all times while looking for new shortcuts to put you ahead. The fun, overblown physics combined with the interactive environments really make you feel like the 3D landscapes are there for more than just eye candy.
A year later, this game got a sequel update in the form of San Francisco Rush: The Rock (Alcatraz Edition). The original game had a meager four cars and three tracks to choose from. Rock ups that to a respectable seven tracks and twelve cars, including joke vehicles like the Volkswagen bus and taxi cab. The most notable new track is the namesake Alcatraz Island course. The level designers take the Alcatraz stage as a chance to really go all-out, filling the track with impossible architecture like loops. They were so proud of this stage that it would go on to make a return appearance in the sequel. Strangely, it’s the only one of the four new tracks that has anything to do with Alcatraz, despite the title.
Daytona USA 2: Battle for the Edge (1998) – Sega AM2
Daytona USA 2: Power Edition (1998) – Sega AM11
Here’s a game that needs no introduction. Much like the original Daytona USA, this game can still frequently be found among side more modern machines in arcades. A big part of that is the multiplayer support. Most racing games around this time were just starting to allow for four-player support. While the original Daytona USA had the ability to link up to eight machines together, Daytona USA 2 pushes that further to a completely ludicrous sixteen-player multiplayer. Few, if any, other racing games since have allowed so many machines to run simulations multiplayer.
As for the gameplay, there’s not much to say about it. It’s built on a different engine than Daytona USA or Sega Super GT, but doesn’t really depart too far from either. The most notable gameplay addition is the new slipstream effect. Now you can build up speed when tailing another car, then shoot past them. If you follow for too long before pulling ahead, expect your speed boost to make you fly into the back of your opponent’s car. Just like the original Daytona, your car will accumulate damage over the course of the race. Here, it’s not just limited to a few dents and worn down tires. By the end of a particularly bad race, your car can end up looking like it’s ready for the junk heap.
This game got an update a few months after release. Daytona USA 2: Power Edition adds the car from the original Daytona USA as a selectable option, along with a new “challenge course” consisting of a single lap from each of the other courses. While these new features are nice, I’m rather disappointed by what they did to the beginner course. In the original, it was an lush, indoor tropical paradise (you can see it in the second screenshot above). The update changes this stage into the far less impressive-looking Daytona Speedway. The change is only visual, but it’s still very disappointing. Power Edition is probably the version people are most familiar with.
California Speed (1998) – Atari Games
As Atari Games found out, San Francisco Rush appealed to a much older sect of arcade gamers than intended. What started as a direct challenge to Cruis’n USA ended up carving its own niche in the arcade scene. California Speed was their second attempt to compete directly with Midway Games (who had actually purchased Atari Games back in 1996, so I’m surprised Midway allowed it). California Speed does nothing to hide the fact that it really, really wants to be Cruis’n. Sadly, it doesn’t do a very good job at it.
Instead of a handful of well-designed tracks like San Francisco Rush, this one goes with the Cruis’n philosophy of “lots of cool-looking courses”. The formula here is that the first half of any given stage is a fairly standard city or moutain area, then it goes completely off-the-wall near the end. This game will take you through active volcanoes, the middle of a busy mall, down roller coaster tracks, through that underwater tunnel that every 3D 90s racing game had, and even top of the Golden Gate Bridge railings. The Silicon Valley stage deserves special mention. Near the end of the level, realism is thrown out in favor of letting you race through a giant computer motherboard. That stage might possibly be the most memorable track of any 90s arcade racer.
The levels have some fun situations, but the gameplay is bland and forgettable. It doesn’t have Daytona USA’s high skill ceiling, Sega Super GT’s beautiful backgrounds, San Francisco Rush’s moon physics and strong level design, or even Cruis’n’s enthusiastic energy. California Speed has nothing going for it outside of a few really cool level designs. Even the controls feel awkward and slow. If you ever see this one in the wild, do yourself a favor and only play it once to experience the Silicon Valley Stage.
From this point on, getting screenshots of the arcade games is difficult. Most future screencaps will be taken from other sources. Credit for these ones goes to Arcade Museum.
Cruis’n Exotica (1999) – Midway Games
I’ve got a better picture of the machine. I just haven’t uploaded it yet.
The original Cruis’n USA, as well as Cruis’n Exotica, ran on hardware falsely toted as N64 hardware. As impressive as it was back in 1994, even home consoles had surpassed it at this point. The new hardware chosen for this project was Midway’s obscure Zeus 2 board. The Zeus 2 only saw use in two games, because after 1999 Midway Games was greatly downsized before ultimately being shut down in 2001 (a reminder: Midway Games was Midway’s arcade division. Midway themselves are still around and making console games). Much like Midway Games, the Cruis’n series was also on its last legs at this point.
After Cruis’n through the USA and the World, it’s hard to up the stakes any further. In Exotica, you find yourself racing through the streets Las Vegas and Thailand alongside fantastical places like Mars and the submerged Atlantis. The only other new feature they could come up with was the ability to change your driver between men, women, and sillier choices like a clown, but it’s an extremely minor detail that only amounts to some alternative sound bites.
Also new to this game is the ability to make your car do a wheelie by double-tapping the gas. If you crash into another car while on your hind tires, you’ll launch off the enemy car like a ramp and get a minor speed boost. This single-handedly fixes the problem from the first two games where oncoming traffic would ram into you constantly. The move can be a bit finicky with its input, so players will generally just spend the entire race frantically mashing the gas pedal hoping they can stay in a constant wheelie.
This game also marks the first appearance of Midway’s trademark pin pad. Entering a numerical password allows you to save your progress and earn unlockable cars based on how many miles you’ve driven. A clever idea that’s very reminiscent of the next decade’s racing games, but it completely undermines itself by also having specific pin codes that let you access the content without having to unlock it. The pin pad system is still used on games to this day.
People were already bored of Cruis’n formula by this point, so the new changes weren’t enough to win their audience back. With Midway Games on the chopping block, most people thought this was the end of the franchise. However, this franchise wasn’t willing to give up quite that easily. Cruis’n and Midway Games’ story isn’t over yet, but we’ll check back in with them during the ’00s.
San Francisco Rush 2049 (1999) – Atari Games
The 1990s were a time of explosive growth for the arcade racing genre. In the span of just 10 years, it went from primitive polygons to some of the most visually breathtaking games on the market. As they say, all good things must come to an end. Atari Games, not to be confused with Atari Corporation, had been under ownership of Midway Games since around the time of the original San Francisco Rush. Rush 2049 was the final game to use the Atari Games name before they were rebranded “Midway Games West” and became Midway’s primary arcade branch for the next few years. In 2001, just two years later, Midway would pull out of the arcade market completely, finally putting an end to the remains of both Atari Games and Midway Games. If you were to choose one game that marked the end of 90s racing games, it would probably be this one.
To set itself apart from the first two games in the series, Rush 2049 takes place 50 years in the future. From the title alone you’d expect a hyper-futuristic game full of flying cars, but it’s far more mundane than that. The cars look only slight more high-tech than modern-day cars and Future San Francisco looks like normal San Fransisco with more neon lights and rounder buildings. The home ports must have agreed that the game wasn’t futuristic enough, so it gave all of the cars little wings that pop out when you’re airborne and let you glide a bit more than usual. It’s something.
The game’s best feature is the new Team Rush option. Much like Crusin’ Exotica, you’re able to register a PIN number and punch it into the game to save your progress. Unlike Exotica, where you simply earned points for playing the game a lot, Rush 2049 hides 100 collectable tokens around the track that need to be nabbed to earn unlocks. Since the hidden shortcuts were one of the best parts of the original Rush, rewarding collectables to players who find them was a stroke of brilliance that really encourages the player to seek them out. It’s one of the best uses of a save system I’ve ever seen in an arcade racing game.
The screencaps above were taken from MobyGames. They’re also from the Sega Dreamcast version, because few to no screencaps of the arcade version seem to exist online.
So ends the 1990s. It may have been one of the most important decades for the genre, but things take a turn for the interesting next time. Racing games embrace save systems, Midway Games gets the last laugh, and a certain video game icon makes an unexpected return to the arcade.