Overall 7 Graphics 8 Sound 9.5 Addictive 8 Story 5 Depth 7.5 Difficulty 7.5
9
Favorite Racing Game for N64 Tido
It's funny how a game can grow on you over time. Playing XG2 as a kid, I never got very far, mainly due to the fact that I didn't really play racing games very much, and that I also didn't have a controller pak to save with. Recently I actually got one, and although it's not working now, I still got pretty far in this game because of it. One of my favorite things about this games is the music. As a kid when I rarely got past Aquanor (which, for those of you who don't know, is the first track) on Easy which was due to lack of patience, attention span, or skill, depending on my mood at the time, my favorite song was probably the Lumania one (the pyramid level). The music for the game, unlike the original Extreme G's more techno feel, is more of a Drum n Bass soundtrack, which I think adds to the atmosphere of each level. On the incredibly dangerous Tethra levels- races which I've actually won by being the only one to not blow up- the music's got a fast drumbeat to keep with the pace of the level, while on Farron- a level overgrown with giant mushrooms and other general swamp life (complete with giant dragonflies)- the music has more of a jungle beat going on. The bikes sound good, and when you hit the side of the tracks, the sound isn't like long nails scratching hard down a chalkboard. The weapons also have interesting sounds, and are announced by a nice lady with an accent I can't quite identify. The levels not only sound good, but they look awesome too (for a high-speed N64 racing game)! One minute, you're flying over a snow-covered mountaintop in Canous, then the next you're fighting to stay out of the lava in Tethra. The gameplay's a bit different from Mario Kart (which is the only other racing game I've played on the N64) in the sense that you hold Z instead of A and that you can actually lose by blowing up after getting hit by a homing missile, for example. This adds a new level of fun and difficulty in my opinion. Just to make it clear, you do have shields which wear down as you get hit or run into walls. You also have a pulsing laser gun that also wears out as you shoot it more and more. The weapons you can get by driving through their tokens scattered through the game range from homing missiles to invisibility to bouncing proximity mines. As you play through the game, it gets more and more challenging, even if you're like me and can be a maniac with whatever you have at your disposal- no matter the difficulty (I still have yet to beat the final race on easy!). But even with all this, the game can be hard to play- a buddy of mine complains about it actually being too hard. If you're going through a tunnel (this is especially bad on Hydra Prime), you can catch on edges and you'll get flipped around, which is really my only complaint with the game. And it took a while, but eventually I was playing this every day to try and finally beat the last level, but some people just don't like this style of game, which is ok. Anyway, all in all I'll have to give this game a 9 for the bit of nostalgia, the challenging gameplay, and the awesome music. If you like futuristic racers, I'm sure you'll like XG2!
Graphics 8 Sound 10 Addictive 7 Depth 8 Difficulty 9
Review Rating: 5/5
Submitted: 01-02-12
Review Replies: 3
User Notice 
