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V-Rally 99 Nintendo 64 Publisher: Infogrames Developer: Infogrames Players: 1-2 Difficulty: Easy Camera: Rear Chase, Close Chase, Hood Additional Pictures Screen 1 Screen 2 Screen 3 Screen 4 Screen 5 Screen 6 Screen 7 Screen 8 Screen 9 Screen 10 Screen 11 Screen 12 Screen 13 Screen 14 Screen 15 Screen 16 Screen 17 Screen 18 Screen 19 Screen 20 Additional Movies Movie 1 Movie 2

Honestly Don't Let These Pictures Get To You, Motion Is Extremely Bad In V-Rally 99 You Know What I Love To Hear Is A Nice Car Crash Sound. Is There Any In V-Rally 99? NOOO! Do I Have To Put Another Picture Up? TACH- O -METER Control: (2) Graphics: (1) Sound: (2) Replay Value: (1) Overall: (Not The Average) (1.5)

Every once in a while, there is a racing game which surpasses everyone's expectations. These games give racing fans and game players alike an accurate look at the world of racing. Gran Turismo, World Driver Championship, and San Francisco Rush have all been games to break the mold. And then you have the real pieces of crap; games which you played once and then returned to the video store once you finished vomiting. And then there's V-Rally 99, for the N64.

V-Rally is your classic racing game. It features a number of officially licensed cars from such brands as Ford, Mitsubishi, Toyota, and Subaru. There are 50 tracks spanning the planet. There are customizable weather options. How could you lose? Trust me, you could lose.

The graphics in this game are absolutely outstanding, if you judge them by a series of standards. You could imagine you were playing on a Super Nintendo, and then the graphics would be great. You could imagine you were playing them it on a Gameboy, and marvel at the brilliant colors and textures. Hell, it would even look pretty good on a Playstation. And I guess you could imagine that you're playing on an N64 with mud on your TV to enhance the dirt road racing experience. The fact is that the graphics do nothing to showcase the power of the N64. The graphics on the tracks are bland, and unvaried. You will hardly be able to tell the difference between the French Alps and the mud of England. There is popup abound in this game, which is good news for you kids who enjoy the books, but for the rest of us it kind of sucks. The cars look marginal in the menus, but seem like big rolling cubes on the course. This game should be renamed V-Rally 86.

I haven't had my license for very long. Two weeks today, in fact. And I'll admit that I am not a very experienced driver. But, I do know that when you take a turn at a high speed, your car does not levitate in the air for 10 seconds before landing on its side and spinning. And yet, in V-Rally 99, the laws of physics have been reversed, making control of the automobiles horribly difficult. You hit a hill, your car does 3 flips. You hit a tree, your car spins and then lands on its back. That was pretty much my racing experience with V-Rally 99. Since the cars are licensed, they take absolutely no damage, which seems to take away from the realism of the game. I'm not complaining, but I think your car should burst into flames when you hit a tree going 200 mph. Control in this game can be summed up in one word: Awful.

In the championship mode, as one might expect, you attempt to win races and move higher up in the world of rally racing. Who else is excited? This isn't a bad thing, but it is a highly overdone thing. I'm sure there's some other way to do this, but it seems as if Infogrames didn't even try. In short, this game has the replay value of a breakfast burrito.

V-Rally 99 is in no way a difficult game. Once you've mastered the horribly terrible physics of this game, you will be able to blow past your competition. After about a half hour, it's like racing against a bunch of rocks.

The sound of V-Rally may be the only part of this game that has some high points. The cars have there own engine sounds, which is good for you engine sound fans out there. Something which was good for me was the fact that there was no in race music. I can't stand hearing the same midi music for 12 laps. But then again, there are some bad points to the sound in this game, much like every other part of it. The in race sounds are very inconsistent. When running into a wall sometimes, it sounds like a tennis serve. And then, when running into, say, another car, there's no sound at all. Can you say realistic? I can. But I guess Infogrames can't. The sound in this game is about as entertaining as listening to a Limp Bizkit album.

I really can't figure out how this game was made for the N64. Maybe it came from some radiation storm, terrorizing its way across Europe until it came to the United States. Or some experiment gone horribly wrong? Either way, V-Rally 99 is a lot like buying a ticket to a Less Than Jake concert: A big mistake. -Andrew Sturgeon