Tokyo Xtreme Racer Zero
This game rules.
Included on this disc are a trailer for The Fast and the Furious and a documentary about highway racing in Tokyo. It is extremely difficult for me to refrain from taking every screenshot from the documentary. You can watch it here.
At first, I thought the cars felt too stiff, but then I realized this game is all about tuning. Problem is, I don’t know anything about cars. This is a huge oversight on my part. When I was growing up, I think I looked down on car people. I thought, “this is too macho for me. I’m going to collect Genesis games instead.” That’s good news for you all because if I had a different outlook, I’d probably be posting on emergencybrake.net instead of writing this. But really, I regret not learning more about these machines that are so integral to living in America. I’m effectively one of those parents that doesn’t know how to install Microsoft Office or hook a Blu-ray player to their TV.
Maybe instead of living in regret, I can try to learn. Maybe Tokyo Xtreme Racer Zero can help me.
I now understand that there is something called horsepower and another thing called cc. I think cc relates to how fast your car can go and horsepower relates to how quickly you can go fast. Obviously, expensive means better, right? Right?
After two hours, I was able to “soup-up” my ride “Shadow Thee Hedgehog” and I could drive fast enough to beat everyone in the inner loop and outer loop. Now there are more loops. I like how this game tracks rivalries. It’s like the nemesis system but instead of orcs, you develop a bitter hatred for sous-chefs and convenience store workers. I love how much detail the developers put into each racer. They all have their own street names, bios, and racing strategies. There are hundreds of them!
I’m afraid that I will spend too much time playing this game. It very quickly drained two hours of my night away when I had only planned to play for 30 minutes. It truly deserved to beat out Gran Turismo 3 in the polls.