21. Outrun
Y'all like some Outrun? I sure do. You might even say I think Outrun is (( * a e s t h e t i c * )).
Yeah, there's this weird, unique energy to this game that makes me want to don a salmon colored button-up and a white jacket and pants, whip on the sunglasses, and hop into the Ferrari Testarossa, Zack Morris cellphone in hand, wired off my tits on a ball of the finest cocaine that 1986 Miami, Florida had to offer. It just feels like that - it's inescapable.
Even though it doesn't scratch the surface of its time-honored arcade predecessor, the Commodore 64 port of Outrun still looks and sounds good within its mid-80s home PC context. "How good" might be a matter for debate, however.
Though the C64 port looks attractive for the hardware on which it runs, with some nice, subtle parallax scrolling between the hills and clouds on the top half of the screen, it can't quite replicate the overall feel of its coin-op daddy. The graphics are even less-defined than some other 8-bit versions (I'd argue Sega's Master System port looks much nicer as a still image), but those versions don't quite handle animation and other visual effects as well as the Commodore.
Our ears unfortunately also find themselves half-satisfied in the passenger seat. Anyone lucky enough to have found themselves behind the wheel of the arcade original will be well-aware of how its synth-rock soundtrack foreshadowed countless 16-bit home computer demos and crack-screens with it's widely-panned stereo tracks, swirling keys, and pulsating 4-on-the-floor electronic drums. The influence of this game's iconic musical cuts extend beyond gamers alone and was reflected in the work of digital artists, designers, and musicians of the era (and maybe even a few nostalgic vaporwave types of the modern day - that means you, Stanley!). Unfortunately, porting this experience to 8-bit means looking at a generational step back, and it may have been an insurmountable task to translate this material to the SID. Despite it's capability for evoking some of the same sonics evoked by FM synths - the fidelity just isn't there. If you look at it as "a good-sounding cover of the original that sounds just like a SID normally sounds", you'll do just fine. Most damningly, the content is cut in half, with only two songs (Splash Wave and Magical Sound Shower) being included.
The gameplay, while again not quite reaching the heights of the arcade version, over-performs on the 8-bit Commodore platform, managing relatively smooth 3D scrolling at a near-arcade-perfect speed. Turning is nice and loose, and I didn't feel like I was slinging myself off the edge of the track every time I touched the gas pedal, unlike some of the game's imitators. (I sure hope you didn't peg me for a Cruisin' USA fan).
So where does C64 Outrun land in the tier of various Outruns? Well, like many others I've reviewed thus far.. best of the 8-bits. Or maybe 2nd best, but losing out to Sega's own Master System is understandable if that's the interpretation we choose to accept. Even Sega found it difficult to do justice to the arcade experience, and Outrun wouldn't get an "arcade perfect" conversion until the game hit Sega's own Saturn console in 1996, 10 years after the release of the original.
It's also worth noting that there are two versions of this game - we're playing the European version by US Gold. The US version is largely similar, substituting a different (arguably no better or worse) scrolling effect on the road that looks a little smoother but doesn't feel as "fast". The car sprite also doesn't look quite as nice - it's a little more chunky and squashed-looking.
Actually, to put it more accurately: US Gold was just the publisher of this version. I wonder what company developed it?
Oh, what's that? It's just a single 17 year old boy, hanging out in his bedroom?
Martin Webb was a young British programmer with extensive experience before he even began work on Outrun, already having developed several games for the ill-fated Texas Instruments TI-99 series computer. US Gold came calling, and he answered the call, turning out a herculean 9-month, one-man effort to bring Outrun from its dual Motorola 68000-equipped arcade board to the C64's utilitarian 6502-alike CPU and the world of European video game retail.
See what I mean about appreciating these things in context? It's always tough to consider perspective when reviewing these games 40 years later. Would I have been happy paying retail for this game nowadays? Absolutely not. Would I have been happy paying retail for it in the late 80s? ..still probably not. Would I have enjoyed it if I my friend showed up on my doorstep with a "backup" copy and dropped it into my 1541? No doubt. At least until the next opportunity I could find to scrounge a few quarters..
Step on the gas and take an Out-Run at Hank's high score! Check out our High Scores page and submit a screenshot to earn your spot in the C128 Hoedown hall of fame!
This site is copyright 2023 Hank Wesley Chorkin. If you don't like it, you can get out!
Back