TOCA Race Driver 2 [PSP]

[S0L]

Another day, another PSP purchase. Toca 2. Where to begin, as yet I've not seen a detailed review of this either...

The long and short of it, it's a slightly rough round the edges looking port of the PS2 version of TOCA 2. If that's all you need to know to buy it, then go for it.

Firstly - the good. The general presentation is top notch. Menus, car select, all the options, just the general feel of it exudes quality. You feel like, even if it's a downsized PS2 game, it's genuinely a quality bit of software, stacked with content, and you've got your money's worth. All modes, as far as I can remember from the home console versions are there - including the wide variety of car classes and racing types. Of course, it also features the superbly voice acted cut scenes from the original - all present and correct, but suffering from the same blurring you get in most PSP video/games when it tries to shift dark colours/blacks about. Overall, you can't complain. The custom soundtrack feature is nice, the wireless multiplay (though untested) would be good I imagine (the original's multiplayer on a single console was decent enough). Load times, while longer than really advisable on a portable game are still well within the realms of not really being worth a mention.

The bad - graphically, it's a strange mixture of good and bad. Squint, and it looks pretty good, but closer examination shows the lovely graphics of the home consoles (especially the Xbox) have taken a battering. I have three major beefs - the wheels on the cars and any vegetation (especially trees) both look awful. The badly textured and animated wheels vaguely remind me of a Saturn game, and the trees are a bit of a mess. How obtrusive both these things are depends on the course, but quite often you'll be feeling quite happy about things, until a tree hoves into view and then your brain goes "this is on a PSP, this is on a PSP...". It's obviously very churlish to complain, when a lot of the graphics are very nice. But it does stray dangerously in Tapwave Zodiac Stuntcar Extreme territory at times.

My other big beef is there is a strange... erm... pixellated feel to the graphics, but it's almost as if you're looking at the graphics through a schoolgirl's sock. It's only visible close up, and if you play the game from about 2 feet away it's not really noticable. But the closer you get, the more irritating it is.

Overall - it sounds like I'm moaning, but I've been very pleased with it so far. It sort of trancends it's limitations, but I would certainly recommend not bothering if you've spent a lot of time with the Xbox/PS2 versions, as you'll be disapointed and spend most of your time squinting. If you're like me, have dabbled in both, and are looking for a racer to tie you over till Burnout Legends, I think it's pretty good.

Strays dangerously close to the Zodiac version Stuntcar Extreme? Get out of it! :P I've got that, and the gap between Toca and SE is about the size of a very large gap indeed.

Still nice review. In terms of you comments on the wheels and trees, as you've pointed out this is on PSP. We had a quite a tall order keeping the detail, physics and number of cars, so we had to make some sacrifices. Trees are large graphics which have to be mipped down a lot in the distance to keep up the framerate, ditto for the wheels - you shouldn't be looking at the sides of cars often, you should be overtaking them

As for the pixellation, we dropped the colour depth on the particle systems, and also draw larger particles (so we can draw less, framerate helper again). Hence you can see the stipple more when they are overlaid.

Still, if you're happy with the game - I can live with the SE comparisons (just) and I'm not going anywhere near the sock thing

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S0L
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[cavalcade]

Lets not talk about the schoolgirl socks any more...

You might want to patent the technique and put it on your CV though S0L!

The Stuntcar comment was also unjustified - I retract it.

[S0L]

LOL - Thanks. I'll be off down the patent office to register 'Schoolgirl Sock Stippling'.

Don't be surprised if I get locked up for that

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S0L
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[NeilMcRae]

Well based on the excellent VT:WT I noted that Sumo had done this game also and bought it on a whim. Its excellent and I'm very pleased with it probably more than others as I haven't played other TOCA games. The custom sound tracks is a superb feature and I hope others follow Sumo's lead and include it in more games. Some times the action slows things down a little but no more than on other consoles in my view.

I can't help but wonder what other great PSP projects Sumo are woking on. Outrun PSP ?

Neil.

[S0L]

Glad you like it.

It's likely you'll see the Custom Soundtrack stuff in at least another game - can't say much about that right now, but you'll know when you see it announced Not necessarily from us either.

We've got some stuff in the works that will be announced soon, which is as much as I can say about future projects from us. You'll have to wait see, but not too long until it'll be out in the open

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S0L
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[NeilMcRae]

You are such a tease SOL lol

Neil

[MonkeyWrench]

Tells us dammit!..or at least PM me

Outrun PSP would be sweet. Can you at least tell us what publisher you are developing for and for what format?

I take it you're licensing out the custom soundtrack code?

[John Beaulieu]

don't suppose its the recently announced Initial D is it SOL?

[S0L]

My lips are sealed. I like working here

Custom Soundtrack wise, we're just giving a helping hand to those that have asked for it. Not licensing it as such.

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S0L
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[Bleeders]

don't suppose its the recently announced Initial D is it SOL?

A western translation of Initial D, that'd be a first if it were true. XD

[John Beaulieu]

A western translation of Initial D, that'd be a first if it were true.

Why not? Outrun2 was coded by Sumo so we all know that Sega trust them with their big names.. in fact I expect that Outrun is more important IP to Sega than Initial D is

[mid]

Oh God please please please don't be doing Outrun2 for the PSP. I really can't afford one.

[Bleeders]

Why not? Outrun2 was coded by Sumo so we all know that Sega trust them with their big names.. in fact I expect that Outrun is more important IP to Sega than Initial D is

It'd be nice if it was to happen, I mean, it's been in the Arcades, so I guess there is a small degree of awareness about it.