A playthrough of Nintendo's 1998 racing game for the Nintendo 64, F-Zero X.
F-Zero X is the direct sequel to the hit SNES launch title F-Zero, released back in 1991. Seven years is a long time to wait for a sequel, especially to a game as well loved as F-Zero was, but true-to-form, Nintendo didn't leave fans disappointed.
Just as F-Zero was a showcase piece for the SNES emphasizing speed above all else, F-Zero X is an insanely fast feeling game that highlights just what the N64 can deliver for a white-knuckle driving experience.
The game features several gameplay modes - there is the classic championship, a battle mode, versus races, and a time trial mode. The real meat of the title is in the championship game ("GP Mode"), where you'll battle it out across four different cups, each comprised of six races. As you clear the cups, you'll unlock tons of new cars, a new difficulty level, and the "X Cup" which features sets of courses randomly generated on the fly.
The racing action makes a fair number of changes to F-Zero's formula, making for a much deeper experience than before. In addition to being able to tweak your car's handling, full analogue control provides much more precision in steering, and the addition of enhanced grip and drift mechanics allow for an entirely different experience between games depending on your preferred driving style and car choices.
I said before that F-Zero X is fast, and truly, there haven't been many games since that can match its sense of speed. The scenery flies by at breakneck speed, and this makes being able to accurately gauge your speed and angle quickly a priority as you zoom through corners. Combine this with an aggressive AI on the higher levels, and you also get one of the hardest racing games around. The master class difficulty level couldn't have been more aptly named.
But this is a huge part of the appeal. Learning the cars and the tracks takes time, but as you begin to improve, you'll be motivated to keep on pushing yourself to place just a bit better with each try. Learning when you should drift or when to wipe out an opponent instead of blasting past them in order to shave a few tenths of a second from a lap time becomes a real focal point, and provides a lot of motivation to keep coming back again and again.
Most critics picked on the game's visuals when it was released, and screenshots don't do the game any justice. Granted, the tracks and cars are largely featureless, and there isn't much detail to be found in any scene, but this was a compromise made to get the game running at a locked 60 fps. It was a good compromise to make - while the game is often very plain to look at (and outright ugly at times), everything moves so fast and is so smooth that you won't have time to notice when you're playing. Playablility was emphasized over good looks, and it absolutely feels like this was the right call to make.
The sound fares better: though the samples all sound highly compressed thanks to the limited storage space in the cartridge, the wailing guitars all make for an excellent accompaniment to the action, and the updated mixes of classic F-Zero tracks sound awesome. I could've done without the annoying, creepy announcer though.
F-Zero X is yet another example of how well Nintendo understood how to make the transition from 2D to 3D while keeping the spirit of a original game intact. The sense of speed, satisfying sense of progression, and the unique track designs all make for an excellent sequel that will keep anyone that loved the first game busy for quite long time.
If you're interested, you can find my playthough of the original F-Zero for the SNES here: • F-Zero (SNES) Playthro...
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No cheats were used during the recording of this video.
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