Championship Rally is (well, was) the last Lynx
game I needed for my collection so I looked forward to
receiving it, no matter how well it played. All of the
other reviews I read about it gave it a fair to good rating,
but I figured I would start with an empty slate.
The game starts with a Songbird screen, followed by the
main Intro screen with some nice graphics, theme song
and credits. This is followed by another screen of credits,
and finally onto the options.
There are a good number of options in the game, including
Tournament, Single Race, Time Trial and Versus. Time trials
is a good place to start, since it lets you get in some
practice. One cool feature of time trials is the "ghost"
car after the first lap that shows where you were on the
last lap. Best lap scores are maintained so long as the
Lynx power is left on.
The control scheme is very simple, steering left and right
with the joypad, and using the 'A' and 'B' buttons for
acceleration and braking, respectively. I didn't take
too long to get used to these controls, and they were
very quick and responsive.
One thing you notice very quickly is that most of the
tracks are marked as "Locked". In order to unlock tracks,
you need to compete in Tournament mode. This presents
you with a "season" of races. You gain points for placing
in races, 1 for third, 2 for second and 3 for third. In
order to progress past the first season you need 8 points,
or two wins and a second place finish on the three initial
unlocked tracks. After playing for about 45 minutes I
hadn't succeeded in winning a season, although I was getting
closer.
Of the three tracks you start with, the first two, Desert
and Meadow, are pretty dull, particularly for time trials.
They're a bit more interesting when you're racing against
game-controlled cars, at least while you're still getting
the hang of the game. The Downtown track is actually kind
of fun, with alternate routes, dead ends and power ups.
I wish I could say something about the remaining four
tracks, but alas, to me they remain locked.
The manual says there are various power ups, moveable
objects and pitfalls. On the first three tracks you don't
get much of a sample of these. I'm also not sure of the
point of the one moveable object I found. I'm guessing
when I do unlock additional tracks I'll get a better sense
of this.
One feature I would really like is some additional variations,
perhaps random. For instance, on the Meadow track, the
same two potholes appear in the same place every time.
While the potholes should be the same for the duration
of the race, it would be nice if they were placed randomly.
More unlocked tracks might be nice, and a track editor
would be really cool. I also understand that this is a
hobbyist effort, and an excellent one at that, and that
Lucien and Carl have day jobs.
I also wish I could report on Versus mode. It looks like
linking up would be a lot of fun, but I don't happen to
know anyone locally with a Lynx and another copy of Rally.
My final rating of "3: Pretty Good" largely reflects my
bias that I like a lot to play with without having to
be too good, and I also like being able to unlock a secret
or two without having acquired much skill.
2008 ben langberg, all rights reserved.