PlanetDreamcast | Games | Reviews | South Park Rally

South Park Rally Page 2/2 Another South Park-branded coaster for your collection - Review By Mad Carl The Bad We gotta admit, it's a rare game where you'll need tips like this. To quote the poet Bart Simpson: "I didn't think it was physically possible, but this both sucks and blows." My God, where to begin with what's wrong with this game? After writing "The Good" section, I feel as if I've been being nice to my sister-in-law all through Thanksgiving dinner, but now I finally have my chance to vent to a friend about what an awful she-bitch she really is. Yes, everything I said before this point is true. South Park Rally has some shining moments. However, much like Kyle's bathroom after a visit from Mr. Hanky, this game has a lot of crap in it. Perhaps the most interesting thing about South Park Rally is that it proves that even if you have well laid-out tracks with inventive themes, decent controls, and lots of characters to play, your game can still fail to be fun. It seems that playing keep away in go karts isn't as fun in reality as it might sound on paper. And the worst part is, I suspect it could be. When you play the standard racing mode, the lack of anything really special in the power up category really shows. And in multi-player, you just find yourself wondering where the other racers went. There is a beautiful nugget of a game here -- it just hasn't been developed and nurtured into something truly fun. Then there are the aforementioned voice samples. First off, you can't hear half of them. When you zap someone with the anal probe, they get rosy cheeks and start to sing, just like Cartman did way back in the first televised episode. Too bad you can't hear the song... even when you stop right next to the afflicted enemy, it's damned tough to make out. Secondly, so many people are saying so many things at once, all I usually get out of my stereo is what Mr. T used to call "jibber jabber." The muddy, messy globules of sound that land in your lap are quite aggravating, mostly because when you have the lead and can actually hear your character, the voice samples are great and really well done. Of course, as is the bane of so many games that use voice samples, you just get sick and tired of hearing the same thing over and over again. The first time Cartman threatens to make a sandwich with your "wee-wee," it's funny. The second time it's less funny. By about the fifty-third time that lap, well, you get the idea. Oh my god, Kenny has herpes! Fortunately, the music isn't harmed by the nasty overlapping of voices. In fact, all that jibber jabber is the best thing that ever happened to South Park Rally's composer. You see, thanks to that just-discussed cacophony of sound effect and voices, it's rare that you can hear just how bad the game's music actually is. This is quite irritating when you stop and think about the fact that the show (and the game for that matter) has a theme song by Primus. And the film had one of its songs nominated for an Oscar! And what about the Christmas episode where Kyle sang about being a lonely Jew on Christmas!? If there's one thing South Park should have in spades, it's good music. Unfortunately, nobody saw fit to involve the show's creators in any creative aspect of this game, and it shows the most in the music. Moving on, the race tracks themselves have little or nothing to do with South Park. I found myself racing about inside some sort of industrial nightmare that was supposed to have something to do with washing Cartman's underwear. While the track design was nifty enough, what did it have to do with South Park? The same thing goes for the farm level and the amusement park. These are all great maps for a racing game, but thematically they just don't jive. And then there's the graphics. Whereas the South Park show benefits from its crude look, South Park Rally just looks ugly. It's almost as if someone at Acclaim had a kid brother who needed to do an art project for his sixth-grade class, and was thus allowed to do the textures. When I look at Wacky Races, another 3D racing game that was also based on 2D art (and far worse art than the intentionally amateurish South Park), I wonder what the creators of South Park Rally were thinking. The creators of Wacky Races were able to spin gold from horse poop. The team behind South Park Rally didn't even seem to care. The staff of the South Park TV show understands this art and are masters of it. Acclaim's artists don't seem to understand that there's any art to it at all. Finally, there's just no reason to unlock new characters -- they're all the same when you get down to it. It's not like Chef handles any differently from Stan. I suppose that when you have 35 racers, it's tough to balance them all. But then again, maybe that should have been a warning sign to the design team. Pick the ten coolest characters and let me race them. Balance them against one another so that each one has their own advantages and disadvantages. Give the game some depth rather than another layer of fluff. Even more irritating is the fact that in the multi-player modes, each racer must have a unique driver. I'd rather have a Battle of the Palette-Swapped Cartmans than I would be forced to drive as Wendy Testaburger. I'd also rather have good old "Respect My Authoratah!" Cartman on his Big Wheel than I would Cartman in his combat jeep. And why does Kenny have the coolest looking go kart? Shouldn't he have something out of Wacky Races, all made out of wood planks and smoking bits? The Final Word Speaking of Wacky Races (which I have done quite a bit in this review), it's a much better game than South Park Rally, and it is the one I recommend to prospective Dreamcast kart racers. South Park Rally plays like a game that was rushed out the door with gameplay modes and features slapped on willy-nilly. It's no better here than it was on the PlayStation or the PC before it. There is a much better kart-style game available for Dreamcast, and I think you know what it is by now. Developer: Tantalus Publisher: Acclaim Genre: Racing Highs: Good control, original track ideas, truckload of characters to choose from. Lows: Music sucks, ugly graphics, tracks seem unrelated to South Park, all characters are identical. Other: 1-4 players, VMU compatible (4 Blocks), Jump Pack compatible. Media: Intro (MPEG) - This intro looks (and sounds) rather familiar... [Big (4.5M)] - [Med (2.5M)] - [Small (542K)] Gameplay 1 (MPEG) - Officer Barbrady snags the trophey, and then the race. [Big (15.8M)] - [Med (8.5M)] - [Small (1.8M)] Gameplay 2 (MPEG) - A desperate chase for the cure to mad cow disease. [Big (16.4M)] - [Med (8.8M)] - [Small (1.9M)] Final Score: (out of a possible 10) Visit this Game's Dreamcast Database Entry Previous Reviews Comments on this review? Mail Feedback.