Dirt Trax FX

"My Brother Said How Popular This Game Was Back in the Day, Yet No One's Reviewed It Yet..."

Uh, boy... the story is essentially, you're racing on motorcycles. On dirt race tracks. Maybe it was supposed to be fun, but somewhere, somehow, they put together this game very badly. Maybe the Mario Kart series has forever spoiled my view on racing games, but even without that... it's a pretty horrid game.

There are a few circuits of different difficulty, with a few races in each circuit. The game starts with around 18 racers (most of them computer), though after each race, close to half of them are eliminated, down to two final racers for the final race. Win it to... win. That's about all there is to it.

The race tracks are all pretty boring though. One ugly track looks like another. And all of the racers except one mean-looking racer are overly easy to get ahead of, meaning the game is pretty much a cinch until you get to the final races of each circuit. All in all, pretty dull, average game. Honestly, not so bad that it's worthy of a score of 2... until you take other things into consideration....

There's also a multi-player mode. Basically, two people can play a tag game, trying to tag the other person in a small area. Each racer has a time limit of about 8 minutes. The one who is ''It'' has to catch the other person so he becomes ''It.'' The time only runs down when you are it. When you are not it, the other person's time runs down. As soon as someone's clock hits 0, that person loses. Really, not too bad, but doesn't really make up much for the sheer awfulness of the game's graphics and music.

Graphics: (1/10)--Oh my GOD, these are HORRIBLE! It seems that they opted to try to use polygons instead of sprites (unlike Super Mario Kart). Or could the SNES could handle polygons even? Anyway, this game is some good proof on WHY the SNES wasn't meant to use polygons for graphics over sprites: the tracks look like a complete mess! The race tracks are all ugly messes of polygons! Mostly a single shade of brown, with a usually dark blue sky. Your racer looks like a nerd the kids in high school beat up. The close-up expressions on his face are hilarious, and geeky! Ah, that priceless facial expression should be enough to raise this game's score, but after thinking about it, no.

Music/Sound: (0/10)--Well, believe it or not, the music is worse than the graphics. I don't know why, but the music is by far the scratchiest I've ever heard in any video game! Jr. Pac-Man for the Atari 2600 had better music than this game! Even if the music weren't so ultra-scratchy, it still wouldn't be great, as it's mindlessly repetitive. One neat thing, though, is that when another racer gets ahead of you, the music is different than when you're in the lead. And when one specific, mean-looking racer gets ahead of you, it actually makes music that wouldn't be semi-decent if it weren't for the fact it's the scratchiest tune on the game! The sound effects are nothing impressive, mostly muted compared to the comparatively much louder scratchy music. Yes, the music is very LOUD! Even with the TV at a low volume, it's quite loud... guess they wanted to make sure you heard this God-awful music!

Overall: (2/10)--Now... honestly, I hate to say this, but it's true: the graphics and sound completely break this game. There's no excuse for a game coming out on the Super Nintendo to look or sound this way. Imagine my hatred of the game, that my brother loved it, and played it so often in my bedroom, while I was doing something else... I was forced to listen to this awful, scratchy, loud music coming from this game! Not fun at all! And the levels all being very bland and uninspired, and you get a game that's just... pretty dang awful!

Reviewer's Score: 2/10, Originally Posted: 12/10/01, Updated 12/10/01