5 Racers That Should be Remade

My iPod is by far the wisest device to walk the face of the earth. To prove it to you, here’s the event that made me realize this… A few days ago, while I killed time indulging myself in some of NFS: Carbon’s drifts, my iPod conveyed to me something extremely profound.

With its earphones plugged deep into my waxy ears, my wisest friend was set on shuffle mode, when it said to me along with the lazy perfection of B.B. King’s guitar, that the ‘Thrill has Gone’. That’s right; “B.B. King – The Thrill has gone” started playing. Could it be a coincidence? Bah! I don’t believe in coincidences. Indeed, I said; my dear iPod, The Thrill has gone. Unlike the old days, the thrill from the racing genre has died; thanks to franchises such as Need For Speed, which have juiced the genre sequel after sequel, to the point that every game is a clone of the previous, plus a few more features and some flashier visuals. Of course, there are a few awesome games like Burnout: Revenge and MotorStorm out there, but such racing goodness is becoming a rarity, since a majority of the racing games these days are pretty much devoid of innovation and they downright stink. With hopes that someday a famed game developer/publisher would read this article and decide to revive one of these long dead racing franchises, here’s a list of racers that I’d love to see remade, using Next-Generation technology…
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**Carmageddon
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A lot of you might not agree with me, but I think gore can be used as an artistic medium. If that is the case, Carmageddon was undoubtedly the Vincent Van Gogh of gory games. Regardless, smearing roads with the blood of innocent bystanders is … *sigh *… magical! You might think that I’m sadistic and deranged (Hmm… maybe I am), but if you’ve played (and liked) the game, you’re probably nodding in agreement with me right now. Carmageddon brought gore into the racing genre in the most shameless way, making each race in their games a satisfying bloodbath. I admit that they might have overdone it a bit (especially with the Pedestrian Electro-Bastard-Ray, lol, I still loved it though), even then, the game was the kind of tireless fun that could satisfy anyone who’s up for something senseless, violent, and fast paced. As a token of my gratitude, I would allow the developer that made a next generation sequel to this game, the rights to run me over a million times. After all, I never realized how much fun squishing civilians was until I played Carmageddon; thank you, Carmageddon.
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**Rollcage
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About 8 years ago, I purchased the best piece of gaming hardware (to play Thief: The Dark Project mainly) I’ve ever owned – my faithful, sturdy, and powerful Voodoo 3 video card. I almost dumped the free CD bundled with it, since it contained a game I’d never heard of, called (you guessed it!) - Rollcage. Since I couldn’t get my hands on Thief: TDP soon enough, and I had quite a lot of free time on my hands, I decided that I’d give this unheard of game a shot – a decision I’ve never regretted. Ahh! The hours that followed just whizzed by, as I indulged myself in this rather unusual racing game. In Rollcage, you gain control of two sided cars called Rollcages, using which you’re supposed to race on rollercoaster-like tracks, that are so twisted that they’ll make you through up. The game’s breakneck speed and twisted action was accompanied by some really awesome music (including a soundtrack by Fatboy Slim), that could get you in the zone as soon as you started a race. The game gave you access to a shit-load of weapons too, which using which you could blow holes into your opponents with ease. If someone made a sequel for this game for next-gen consoles, the results would be truly brain-melting – a mix of brain numbing speeds and extremely powerful weapons can never go wrong, right?
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**Hi-Octane
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Hi-Octane is another high-speed, futuristic, cyber-punk racing game, that I first played on my friend’s ancient 486 machine, as a breather between long Doom sessions. Before I knew it, I started playing Hi-Octane more than I played Doom. The game featured some extremely large, open tracks, in which you could make the best of your seemingly unlimited speed. The thing I loved about the game is that even though the speeds were really high, the vehicles controlled like a charm. Just like Rollcage, Hi-Octane gave you access to a few weapons such as a mini-gun and missiles. The mini-gun had unlimited ammunition, but would overheat if you spammed it, which restricted you from exploiting this weapon; while missiles were limited and far more devastating that the mini-gun. Even though the game used some primitive technology, the destruction looked and felt awesome. If someone revived the game using next-gen technology, rest assured, there’d definitely be a huge amount of destruction in it. With speeds almost twice as fast as Burnout: Revenge, the game would be as gorgeous looking and head-ache inducing as the original (which isn’t as bad as it sounds). This title would definitely satiate the speed addict in all of you; someone please give us Hi-Octane 2!
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Road Rash

Just to make things clear, Road Rash is not the sore between your legs that you get from hours of riding; no sir, we’re not talking about that kind of rash. Road Rash was a game based on some rash urban racing using bikes, which was the first racing game to feature a combat system, which was realistic; I mean who hasn’t been kicked off their motorcycle before? Hmm, if you think about it, maybe it wasn’t THAT realistic; but if you’d tell me that the game wasn’t fun, the next time I see you on a bike, I’ll kick you off it! Bad jokes apart, the series started with some pretty basic concepts, but as it evolved over time, more innovation was pumped into it, such as the concept of Gangs. Imagine having a gang of hardcore bikers racing and coordinating with you, to beat the living shit outta your opponents – quite fascinating, I know, but unfortunately the idea didn’t live on for long as the innovation in the franchise died out when EA totally commercialized the series, bringing it to the PSP along with a gazillion other platforms. Let’s hope that someday someone knocks some sense back into EA, and makes them develop a nice all-rounded gaming experience based on the concept of Road Rash, for next-generation consoles. Just imagining the possibilities in the multiplayer aspect for such a game makes me drift away … buyable weapons … combat bike upgrades … a persistent biking world …. Free-roaming! … Online biking gangs/guilds … *drifts away*…
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Rock ‘n Roll Racing

The first time I played this game I had no clue what Rock n’ Roll was. But the game’s fast and competitive racing that was in-tune with its f**** **** awesome classic rock soundtracks, played a huge role in making a rocker out of me. The game’s style and presentation was spot on, with some pretty deep (for the time) mechanics in place that would keep you hooked onto the game for a while. Racing your ass off on alien planets, with a background score of ‘Steppenwolf – Born to be Wild’ has never been better! Not that it’s been done before, but whatever. The game was all about participating in some isometric view road races against interplanetary opponents. As you would win races, you’d gain cash and points, which could be used to buy cars/upgrades or unlock different planets respectively. The best part about the game was the weapons and the boosts that could be purchased; this sort of thing was never implemented to perfection back then, but somehow, in Rock n’ Roll racing it was. A next generation version of this could be somewhat like Test Drive Unlimited (we’ll have a review put up for TDU soon), which is sort of a massive multiplayer online racing game, which forms a sort of cross between a racing and racing lifestyle game. Man, I would just love to be able to do that on an interplanetary scale. Imagine traveling to different planets and racing against actual people there; imaging going to different corners of the galaxy to purchase exclusive parts to pimp out your car. Think of the game somewhere between EVE online and TDU; quite ambitious, I know, but a very exciting though, isn’t it?