August 23, 1991 — F-Zero

Now this is pod-racing!

Billed as one of the greatest games of all-time, I’ll grudgingly admit that for a racing game from 1991, it’s merited, if only historically so.

Another launch title that makes liberal use of Mode 7, a form of rendering faux-3D landscapes, but it’s less annoying than it is in Pilotwings. What F-Zero could have used is a bit more direction, hopefully explained in the instruction booklet. But it continues to raise the question, why would I buy a video game if I need to read a book first? In 1991, you were clearly playing a video game because you were avoiding reading or all out of books.

But, if you did the required reading, you’d find out that F-Zero is set in 2560, where interactions with aliens have allowed multi-billionaires to improve F-One racing, to create F-Zero. Though not pictured, this is the world that Captain Falcon is from. He’s a bounty hunter and that has absolutely nothing to do with racing, but included in the instructions was an eight-page comic about Falcon’s bounty hunting adventures.

You choose from four vehicles, with several stats that are difficult to compare or gauge, though it boils down to lower top speed/faster accel or higher top speed/slower accel. From there, decide if you want to be in the Knight, Queen, or King League, which is fairly obvious, but maybe not obvious enough.

During each race in the top left corner it tells me I’m “Safe 5” or “Safe 15,” and I had to use Google to figure out it was telling me the place I needed to finish the lap to survive.

For each completed lap, you’re awarded a jet boost, but it’s never explained, and I never used it and did just fine.

The maps are decent, though it feels like you might be able to jam the acceleration and never use the brakes if you’re good enough at steering.

Occasionally, there’s a road feature that lets you do a jump, is that good? It’s not really clear. Also, what’s my motivation? I’m just racing in the future for the sake of racing. (Writing that makes me feel like a real Cranky Kong.)

Otherwise, each race does feel tense and you do have to focus on steering and maneuvering to maintain a good position. And if it goes wrong, if you bump a wall or hit a bumpy part, it can be hard to recover the race.

The soundtrack is surprisingly good.

Total play time: 1 hour.

I played an entire series, but after the first five races, I kind of know what to expect. There’s definitely replay value with the two-player mode though.