The first time I even heard the name Sonic & Sega All Stars Racing, I could not help but think Mario Kart clone. With a load characters from Sega’s past, present and future thrown into a wacky races style racing game – with weapons, question mark boxes and brightly coloured crazy race tracks, you can’t help but think Sega have definitely sped down the same route as their long-term rivals, who have made Mario Kart games since their first release back on the Super Nintendo entertainment System in 1992.
I have now made it abundantly clear that Sonic & Sega All Stars Racing (Or S&SASR as I am now going to call it to save my fingers) is a lot like Mario Kart, so lets leave this fact aside now and look at this game as a separate title.
Right from the get go the demo gives you a choice of two characters to race as, our good friend sonic and the Xbox Exclusive character Banjo & Kazooie. As this is only a demo you can only play a single race or a 2 player split screen single race; as there was no one to play with at this given time, I went for the single race, and I of course chose Sonic first - I have grown up with the blue needlemouse so I thought it would be rude not to.
As with all racing games you start right at the back of the group as the 3 second count down starts, it is then your job drive round the circuit in a three lap race trying to get over the finish line first. It’s the racing game standard that has not been changed for decades. However, in S&SASR you are have the opportunity to drive into question mark boxes which in turn give you either a power up or a weapon to use to your advantage. So you could get a considerable advantage over your racing opponents if you use these power ups tactically. Now from previous Mario Kart experience i had some knowledge of what the weapons did, as they were quite similar. But as I played through the race countless amounts of times I noticed that this game really bring in a challenge, even on beginner mode I struggled to get first place, which brings a smile to my face. I love a challenge. Mind you the countless amounts of times I did get into 8th place gave me an advantage, if you are lucky enough to hit a question mark box while trailing behind the other racers, who will get your all-star special item. Each of these is a unique power that each racer has to get back into the race. Sonic for example has all the chaos emeralds at his disposal and turns into super sonic, giving him a huge boost in speed which you can increase by repeatedly pressing A. One of my favorites though has to be Amigo’s from Samba De Amigo. He unleashed his special just as he was passing me, he got a boost in speed and then drew all of his opponents into a huge conga line. All the racers were dancing behind him, and as soon as his power ran out, the other racers exploded….Awesome.
While you are racing around your circuit, you will come across jumps, these jumps can again be used to you advantage, as you take to the air start mashing the left trigger to pull off an array of aerial tricks. If you manage to land on all four wheels you will immediately get a boost in speed, the more tricks you pull off, the more boost you will get when you land, meaning if you have a heart of a daredevil you will take some comfort in this small game mechanic.
As you can well imagine with the cast of crazy characters and a whole variety of ludicrous weaponry and power ups, thew circuits themselves aren’t going to be on the plane mundane side, even though the demo only offers you one circuit, there is a chance to take a sneak peek at what will be available track wise, in the full game, you got tracks inspired by the sonic games which will have a lot of loop the loops and helix turns. You also have tracks inspired by house of the dead, samba de amigo and super monkey ball just to name a few. So you can expect a whole variety of whack and wonderful tracks to race around when the game comes out on full release.
From what I have played and seen of S&SASR I will be defiantly keeping my eye on it, it looks to me that a lot of thought has gone into the characters for this game. I mean you would never think a monkey in a marble from super monkey ball being pitted against some hard-core fist fighters from virtua fighter in a race would ever work but it strangely does. A lot of imagination has gone into this game and I think it is a worthy competitor for Mario Karts throne.
Garv
