In 1998 Codemasters released Colin McRae Rally for the PSOne and i will be honest here, alongside Formula One, Rally driving was the ‘in’ sport at the time. As Colin McRae was the icon for Rally driving why not give him his own racing game?

When you first load the game up you are treated with a nice opening montage of the game, in 1998 it was safe to say that Colin McRae Rally had the great graphics that the PSOne had until Gran Tourismo had shown its face. On the Menu Screen, there are 4 types of event, these being Championship, Rally, Time Trial and Rally School. Most people would have gone straight into the action by choosing the Championship mode. I tried that and i struggled finishing 6th!

The Rally School is a great way to learn the trade of being a rally driver, from learning the drift style of the car to getting the right turning angle given to you by your co-driver shouting “3 left- tightens.”

Once that was out of the way, there is nothing better than to go straight into the Championship where you can choose one of the following 8 cars: Subaru Impreza, Mitsubishi Lancer, Ford Escort WRC, Toyota Corolla, Renault Maxi Megane, Seat Ibiza Evo2, VW Golf or the Skoda Felica. All of these are great cars but i struggled to find much to tell them apart performance wise.

Then we have the 8 different courses that range from New Zealand to Sweeden to United Kingdom. Graphically being honest as it is a retrospective look back to 1998 it serves the game well and the mechanics used for this truly give a great feel to the game! However, if gamers want to go and play this game be prepared for some old school textures! Come on people this was a great game back in the day!

The addition of variable weather to the game is a nice touch. You could be racing in complete sunshine or worse yet, snow! All this plus driving at different times in the day give you a tough drive through the game. Compared to Colin McRae Dirt, i personally think that this game is a arcade gamers heaven and you are rewarded well if you put the craft in learning the corners and techinques involved in each race.

For me the Multiplayer is one of the key selling points of this game. Compared to games now where you can play people over Live or the PSN you had your mates next to you going at it split screen fighting in either Time Trial or Rally getting the quickest times. Pure thrills all the way with this one.

In closing of this article Colin McRae Rally is a good investment as you can get this on ebay for around the £2 mark for a game that is fun and addictive to play providing a great multiplayer to boot.

Back in 1998 Capcom released then sequel to the popular Resident Evil. This time the game was spread over 2 discs and boasted a lot more zombies and gore.

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Wipeout was one of the first official games at the launch of the PlayStation 1 back in 1995. The team behind this game Psygnosis had a big job on their hands to make this game a success as this was the first of its genre on the 32-bit era.

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I had never realised how many games consoles i have from the past since i was young, all my family thought i was mad to keep them, im proud to say that im proud of them, even though i do not play them all of the time.

The only consoles im missing from my generation are the Sega Dreamcast and the NES. I admit i got rid of my old Game Boy and Game Gear as i never played them.

So then, having a look at the picture above, i own the following:

Sega Mega Drive
Sega Mega Drive 2
SNES
Master System
Nintendo 64
PlayStation 1
Xbox
Colour Gameboy

Even on top of this i have 40 Master System Games and 57+ PS1 Games.

Im always on the lookout to buy new consoles and retro games, if you have any ideas and prices then drop me a line at retrozoid@retrozoid.net

 

We have an exclusive interview with the Editor of Retro Gamer Magazine, the magazine is a MUST READ every issue, a big thank you to Darren and Retro Gamer Magazine for this. Here it goes(edit: Thanks to Greg Richmond for the idea to interview Darran)

Tell retrozoid.net a bit about yourself

My name’s Darran Jones and I’m the editor of Retro Gamer. I’m 34 years old and have lived in the Bournemouth/Poole area all my life.

Tell us about your job role at Retro Ramer

I’m the editor, so ultimately I’m responsible for quality control within the magazine, its actual content and I even write the odd article or two. It’s an incredibly hectic job, but also one that’s amazingly rewarding.

How long have you worked at Retro Gamer and do you enjoy your job?

I’ve been in charge of the magazine ever since it relaunched in December 2007. I absolutely adore my job, as it’s challenging, enjoyable and there’s always something new to do. There’s nothing more satisfying that holding a magazine you’ve helped create at the end of a long, hard month.

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