First, let’s get this straight right off the bat --
MagForce Racing is
Killer Loop for the Dreamcast. It’s got a few neat new features, and the graphics are even smoother than the PSX version, but for all intents and purposes, it’s the same game, different name. Unfortunately, some of the design decisions that VCC made when translating the game to the Dreamcast hurt it more than it should have.
For those of you not in the know, MagForce Racing is a futuristic racer, where you drive MK tripods around various tracks at dizzying speeds. The MKs are equipped with magnets, which let you hang upside-down on various segments of track and do other neat tricks. Smart pilots will keep the automatic magnet help on, as the tracks move too fast to remember where you have to press the magnet or risk falling off.
The Dreamcast port offers a few new features that the PlayStation version didn’t. First and foremost, there’s now a multiplayer mode. You can race up to three of your friends on the various tracks, either in normal-style mode or arcade mode, where you get to select just how you want the game to be in terms of power-ups. This is a nice addition, since it was one of the major beefs with the original Killer Loop. But, alas, it does not make up for the problems with MagForce Racing.
First of all, MFR controls a hell of a lot easier than Killer Loop did. Most people would see this as a benefit, and I sure did at first. Only after playing a while did the full impact of this come to me. Since the controls were tightened so much, the difference between the various vehicles available to you has become practically nothing. In Killer Loop, each vehicle handled pretty differently. A curve you could just slam into with one MK required careful banking in another. Not so in MFR. You’ll find that the same racing strategy works for each car. This is a disappointment, as picking the car that fit your style best was part of KL’s fun.
Second, the A.I. was dumbed down considerably for MFR. In Killer Loop, if you didn’t put up a good fight from the beginning, chances are you’d come in last. In MFR, however, I found myself finishing first on nine-tenths of the tracks that I raced, first try. To make sure that this wasn’t just because I wasted untold hours on the original, I played some more Killer Loop. Sure enough, I got trounced considerably more often there than in MFR. While this may help people first playing the game, after they get relatively good at it, they’ll find that most of the races will consist of them zooming into first place and driving around the track twice by themselves. Fun at first, yes, but ultimately boring.
The third is both a good thing and a bad thing. MagForce Racing has one new main vehicle and two new main tracks. While this is very cool -- I personally love the new Osaka track, although I find Underground to be merely passable -- some of the same conditions exist for opening up secret vehicles. For example, to get the animal Class 1 racer, you have to beat the Class 1 races with every vehicle. This wasn’t so bad in Killer Loop, as three vehicles and four tracks (Moscow, Mars, Hawaii, and the Himalayas) meant only 12 races. In MFR, however, you’ve got four vehicles and five tracks. That’s eight more races. When you get to the second class, you go from KL’s four vehicles and five tracks (Needle Rock appears), making 20 races to MFR’s five vehicles and seven tracks (Needle Rock as well, plus Underground), which makes 35 tracks. 15 more races means 15 more times of breaking out into first and running around the track a few times, bored. This wouldn’t have been bad at all if the A.I. hadn’t been weakened, but as it is, racing every vehicle around the track enough times to open the secrets becomes an exercise in monotony.
The Killer Loop itself, one of the more boring tracks in the first game, has been replaced with the Moebius, which brings a nice, er, twist to the game. Most people won’t even bother racing enough to get it, though.
There are also new weapons, but they are all just as useless as they were in KL. Fortunately, every type of weapon ends, once you get four power-ups, in the Boost Ram, which is the most useful power-up in the game, so you don’t have to throw power-ups away to get to that point.
