Motocross Championship

[Melf]

Oh look, a motocross game on the 32X! If only it were as good as we had hoped it would be. Sadly, Motocross Championship is one of those games that friends point to and snicker whenever you try to defend your investment in a 32X system. It's ok friends. We know exactly how you feel. Come read our full review and let us ease your pain.

[j_factor]

This game really sucked.

[ary incorparated]

no the game was decent and the graphics werent that bad,ever played GBA not much games on gba shows this,so grapichally its oke it plays like pinball i agree but still this games isnt worse,besides it is 3d,BTW i hated doom more for its sucking music.the same with metal head still very underated if you can pick this game for a very samll effort,why not its an add to your 32X collection,if this is just shit than jeremy mc rath on DC is even shitter,the same graphs as this game but thn only on DC.

[ary incorparated]

sorry it does suck i played it and quited the game in less than 10 sec. i give it a 3 because at least its a road rash rip of with really lame controls and graphics.shit is not much compared to this.

[Chris Marsh]

When I had all of the 32X parts, I used to play this game. I thought it was pretty lame. The choppy animation makes the game play poorly and is much worse than Road Rash. This game also has a guy that looks like Terry Bradshaw when you lose the race (Loser 00).

[David J.]

In the review, I forgot to mention that I was eager to play this back in the day. It was pretty well hyped.

I still have my copy and I think I am going to run it over with my car.

[ary incorparated]

Make it suffer and sent a video yes that would be master like send the most origenal way of killing youre 32x including the shitty games.

[Forgotten Worlds]

I was playing this game with no music on and the sound effects kept making me think of Excite Bike on NES. A few pro-tips: Hold down and the B Button while doing any kind of a jump to avoid crashing. I spent most of my races just holding Down and B. I'd only hit Up and B in the straight away to go faster. Holding Up-Right and B at the start of the race helped me to avoid the pinballfest at the start of the race.

[Da_Shocker]

Hell I thought the game was ok but i've never played much of Road Rash before.

[The Sports Guy]

This is one of perhaps the 25 worst games EVER.

[kgenthe]

No offense to David, but I get the feeling you didn't play this one through.

The presentation is only the first area where Motocross Championship fails miserably. The graphics are really, really bad. I mean the graphics are so pixilated that it will give you a headache. The bikes look like garbage, and the backgrounds look really poor. A poor frame rate is even more insult to injury. Shouldn't this be a title to show off the capabilities of the 32X? The visuals are more like another reason not to invest in one.

There is minimal pixelation in general. When a bike gets close to the screen, it's pixelated, but thats a symptom of the sprite scaling. When the fighter jets are close to the screen in After Burner, they do the same thing. For the most part the sprites are crisp and clean. I found the actual track itself looked fairly good, with an almost "textured polygon" feel. The frame rate is poor, but not unplayable.

Motocross plays a lot like the classic Road Rash, but this time with dirt bikes. The problem is that these are two totally different types of racers, and bumping and grinding your way to victory shouldn't be the main focus of a motocross game. Players should have to actually race, getting to know their bikes and each course. Being bumped around like a pinball gets frustrating very quickly. The twelve tracks and are good and all, but they are too small and cramped. I really wish there were a time trial or practice mode.

This game is NOTHING like Road Rash, at all. You do actually have to race. You have to memorize the course to be successful. You have to load and unload your suspension (up and down) to get over the jumps and whoops. There is a practice mode. Once you get a hang for the controls and tracks, you won't get bumped around like a pinball. Playing the game on the amateur difficulty is a very playable experience. (the harder difficulties are broken)

Don't get me wrong, this is not a great game. It might not even be a good game. But for racing fans, this is a serviceable and sometimes enjoyable game. I'd say it's more "average" than "bad."

[goldenband]

I just beat this game, and kgenthe is totally on point. (This review is also well worth reading.)

There are a lot of people who trash this game because it isn't Road Rash, or because they haven't bothered to figure out the controls, or because it's fun to channel the AVGN and talk smack. Or whatever. But the game is 100% playable once you figure it out, and the best sections get pretty fun. Maybe it sucked to play $60 for this back in 1995, but so what? It's a $5 game now, and it's worth every penny.

There are absolutely some problems with it, mind you, and some of them are big-time:

- The "pinball-fest" at the beginning is obnoxious, though super-easy to avoid
- More generally, the fact that the tiniest collision with a fellow rider robs you of forward momentum, even in midair = makes no sense whatsoever
- Being able to crash into the banner at the finish line gets incredibly annoying after a while
- Password interface sucks - a button to toggle between upper- and lowercase would save so much time
- Ending is non-existent
- Gets less fun as your bike gets faster, since it becomes very difficult to corner (especially w/ the Superbike)
- Completely lacks bells and whistles, and feels rushed in general: there should've been more course variation (esp. between difficulty levels), more music, an onscreen map display, option to retire mid-race, etc.

But OTOH it's fantastic to play a racing game that has virtually no rubberbanding or enemy collusion. If you race well, you won't suddenly get caught by a fast-moving "anointed" opponent. (That's the way to play this game, BTW -- open up a big lead early on. While you'll have one or two bikers who might push you, you'll avoid the clusterf**k that often ensues with racers #4-9 or so.)

If you fall way behind, the fact that you can catch up reflects the fact that the bottom half of the pack are bad racers -- they don't suddenly get worse in order to help you. And the computer opponents mess up and wipe out all the time, and will sabotage each other no less enthusiastically than they sabotage the player.

Melee attacks aren't useless at all (as some have claimed) -- you can't really target your opponents, but you can connect with a well-placed swing here and there, and that's all you need.

I don't know why people complain about the framerate -- it's perfectly fine, and not once did I feel like I wasn't getting the visual information I needed to ride effectively (at least not because of the framerate -- the puddles do seem to come out of nowhere sometimes). I also like the fact that you can't see the ground when you catch a lot of air. That's how it is in real life! It forces you to memorize the course, know where you're going, and compensate well in advance for the upcoming twists and turns.

BTW I didn't have any trouble at all on the higher difficulty levels, so I don't know what kgenthe thinks is broken. There were one or two races where I struggled mightily, especially Track #8/250cc/Pro difficulty. Something about that combination made it very difficult to manage, and I had to put together a basically perfect race in order to win. Otherwise it was fine, though.

[goldenband]

BTW, another reason to open your heart to this game -- the password for the final set of levels is, I kid you not:

gDAAAAAAAYM

[Ecco]

This game seems great to me!

Why is it so hated? And there is a practice mode, with level select & bike select!

The framerate doesn't bother me. Hell it looks similar to the slight choppiness of Batman Returns (SCD) driving stages. They're also slightly low-framerate but fine, and no one complains about choppiness in Batman Returns. (I don't know how to measure framerate but the choppiness just looks similar to me in both games.)

Plus Motocross has texture-mapping, & the 3D geography must be the nicest 3D geography on the 32x (besides Virtua Racing). All different 3D hills, mountains, jumps, etc.



For contrast, one game that I can't enjoy bc of framerate is Metal Head. I really want to enjoy this game but the extreme choppiness makes it too difficult to enjoy most of the time...

[Da_Shocker]

This game seems great to me!

Why is it so hated? And there is a practice mode, with level select & bike select!

The framerate doesn't bother me. Hell it looks similar to the slight choppiness of Batman Returns (SCD) driving stages. They're also slightly low-framerate but fine, and no one complains about choppiness in Batman Returns. (I don't know how to measure framerate but the choppiness just looks similar to me in both games.)

Plus Motocross has texture-mapping, & the 3D geography must be the nicest 3D geography on the 32x (besides Virtua Racing). All different 3D hills, mountains, jumps, etc.



For contrast, one game that I can't enjoy bc of framerate is Metal Head. I really want to enjoy this game but the extreme choppiness makes it too difficult to enjoy most of the time...

BEcasue we should've had this: