Cruis'n USA

"Not as good as the arcade version, but still..."

What do you get when you put four incredibly fast cars, race them against eight other different colored cars and it just so happens that the tracks are the highways of USA? Well, I guess its obvious that you get Crusin' USA. Yes, your eyes aren't beseeching you. Crusin USA, the arcade game, is on the N64, and after owning the game for about 10 years, I have really have only one word to describe this game: meh.

GRAPHICS
Well, I guess this is what the N64 is capable of doing, even if the graphics aren't exactly pushing the power of the console. The cars and the backgrounds are OK, but they could have been better looking.

Lets take an in-depth look at the cars that you drive in this game. Most of the time, they look like real cars, but there are a few that look square than rounded. Take the red sports car that you can choose from at the beginning for example. It looks more like a car from the future than a car from 1994, and yes, I know is support to be a mustang, but its hard to tell because some thought that it would be a good idea to not change the texture of the glass from the rest of the car.

The backgrounds are better, but most of the times, they are just 2-D picture followed by a 3-D looking foreground, and it can really show in different places when you're driving. What I mean is that most of the time, the 3-D images of the backgrounds looked smeared together. Why are they smeared? Well, that's because the N64 has this software built in it to blend pixels together, so while it might seem to make the visuals more life like, it can be over done. It shows in this game, constantly.

SOUND/MUSIC
Just like the visuals, the audio is also something that isn't much to listen to. The quality of the sound is somewhat distorted and muted at times, so you might have to turn up the volume to hear it.

The sound effects are pretty plain. Most of the time, all you will hear is your cars engine revving up, the crowd cheering when you win and the voice acting in between the levels. The most common voice that you will hear is that of a girls counting down how much time you have left to start the race, which is usually about three seconds.

Getting away from the sound, the music is just passable this time. Most of the music that you will hear in this game is that of stereotypical songs that you would expect to find in the US. You have your surfing song, your techno city song, and many others. However, most of the time, they get tiring to listen to, so its best to turn the sound off until you want to hear it again.

GAME PLAY
If you have played the arcade version of the game, then you know what the game is about. It's a racing game were you travel across the US to claim your prize. The N64 version, however, has more things to do in it that its arcade counterpart, but that also means that this game is also harder to control.
When you first the game, you are greeted by a nice little video of a car smashing into a sign, followed by three other cars who also thirst for victory. Its pretty good and it might seem like the game will be exiting. So after all of that, you get to choose between 6 different files and your game begins, well almost. The next screen allows you to play one single race, or 'Crusin The USA' mode, so its what you would see if you played the arcade. So after all of that, you pick you car and you're off.

So this is where the game begins to get more exiting, but unfortunately because of these sloppy controls, the game is much harder to play than the arcade. First of all, to steer, you use the analog stick, which is sometimes unresponsive or too responsive. Both are bad because they make you crash into something that you didn't plan of running into.

Not only that, but the computers in this game are hard as nails. They will constantly speed up to you, push you and try anything to make you spin out, which is stupid because usually when you ram a person, they get pushed to that side. However, in this game, there is this stupid glitch that pushes you car away from them, resulting in you either losing a ton of speed, or you spinning out, while it leaves the computer unharmed. Not only that, but you cant drift in this game, so forget about getting a boost of speed when you need it.

However, if there is one thing that I can't stand about the racing mode, it's the other drivers on the road. These people are incredibly annoying, and yes, I can understand that it adds depth to the game, but come on; they always find a way to hit you. Then there are people who actually want to ram you. It's the drunk drivers that constantly hit you every single time!

Now, there has to be good parts about the game, right. Well, yes, there are some good things about this racer, but not really a whole lot that interests me. As I said above, when you complete the game in the arcade, you get nothing new, but in the N64 version, when you complete the game, you are treated to a celebration on top the white house, and your car gets transform into a different color, along with a performance update.

REPLAY VALUE
Actually, the game does have decent replay value. There are many maps to unlock, many different cars to get, and all the colored/ performance upgrades to achieve. This game might take you a few months to complete, but not a whole lot to keep you interested for a long time.

GET IT OR PASS IT: I would just rent this one, or just stay away from it. It might sound like a cool idea to play this game, but it really is just a weekend game that you play with a friend when you're both board to tears.

CONCLUSION:
Crusin' USA might seem like a great game, but it actually isn't. There are many better racing games out there, so its best to leave this one alone, but if you have it laying around your house, I would say play it if you have time to kill before work.

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 04/18/08, Updated 11/30/09

Game Release: Cruis'n USA (US, 12/03/96)