Retro|Spective 116: Micro Machines

[Neon Ignition]

History in Games:
1991 - Micro Machines
1994 - Micro Machines 2: Turbo Tournament
1996 - Micro Machines Turbo Tournament '96
1996 - Micro Machines Military
1997 - Micro Machines V3
2000 - Micro Maniacs
2002 - Micro Machines Remake
2006 - Micro Machines V4
2017 - Micro Machines World Series

Overview:
In many ways the games have outlasted the appeal of the toys that inspired the series. Releasing over two decades the games have been so beloved that even during dry spells between instalments there have been homages and direct copies in plenty. Typically viewed from a top down perspective, the games make use of the tiny scale of the vehicles in their track design, heavily focusing on trying to remain on screen as well as traditional racing as you navigate obstacles created from comparatively large objects such as desk tops, gardens and kids room floors.







Share your thoughts and memories of the Micro Machines series

[QualityChimp]

Ah such a brilliant series!

So inventive too! Not only a clever idea of having toy cars racing around domestic tracks, but also little things like the J-Cart with two extra jopad inputs to make it 4-player and the ability to share a PSOne pad between two players meaning, with a multitap, you could have eight players at the same time!



I think V3 was my favourite as it nailed the 3D aesthetic so well and played so brilliantly.

Even the menu screen was cool!



I don't think the games have outlasted the toys, though. There was and eleven year gap between the last two games, but the toys have remained in the shops and got new licenses like Star Wars.

There's a toy retrospective coming out from Bitmap Books next year, if anyone is interested in them.

[Leon Retro]

As much as I wanted to enjoy the original Micro Machines, I always found the feel of the game too fiddly, and that was across a range of machines. I really liked the art work though. I remember playing the 3D OG Xbox version and thinking it was OK but a bit bland.

This reminds me that I've never played 'Micro Maniacs', even though I've been meaning to for years.

[Cepp]

I love the NES game and played it to death as a kid. To this day I'm convinced it came on a grey cart although there's no proof anywhere that it ever did! It gets brutally hard later on though and takes some practice.

Never played it on the MD but I always thought having controller ports built into the cart was a neat idea. Presumably you have to be careful of tugging the wires though to stop the game from freezing? I could definitely see some sore losers pulling a fast one with that

I have V3 installed on my PC waiting to go. Completely agree that it has a gorgeous and awesome looking menu.

[Dogg Thang]

The Megadrive games were some of my favourite on the system. The j-cart was brilliant and such a great idea. And '96 even had a track editor. I could write so much more but I'm supposed to be working...

[JazzFunk]

The 'new' version is 30fps, apparently.

I always found the MD games uberslick but just way too frustrating! But they were brilliantly made and verrrrry Britishly retro in vibe with that cheerful, vintage Codemasters feel.

I was more an F1 Circus Billy-no-mates cos our kid didn't like MM and never wanted to play in 2P, the tw@.

[Cepp]

The Megadrive games were some of my favourite on the system. The j-cart was brilliant and such a great idea. And '96 even had a track editor. I could write so much more but I'm supposed to be working...

Go on, work's overrated

[wakka]

I LOVE Micro Machines! A game that really, primarily, is about griefing. And it's great

Turbo Tournament on MD was the gateway drug. What a brilliant game! The J-Cart was indeed genius, and worked really well. Such a great mix of levels and settings, I loved that multiplayer was played in playlists of particular level themes, and I still wake up sometimes with the 'Next Race' music in my head...



I had loads of fun on it when I was a kid with friends, then resurrected it when I was at uni. We had a Wii with 4 remotes, and it worked great via Genesis Plus GX on the Homebrew Channel. It was kinda the perfect way to play, honestly, since the controllers were wireless. Also, my many years of training during the 90s did me proud, and I won most of the time

Classic levels include:



The one with the sponge raft

The sponge would slowwwwwllly carry you across the sink. That meant that everyone could either have a truce, in order to get across and get on with the race, or endlessly, ENDLESSLY ram each other off it in a series of no-win scenarios. You could torment your friends for hours! Amazing fun.



The one with the toilet seat

​This one was great. Really, really fast cars (maybe the fastest in the game), on a narrow toilet seat from which you could (and usually did) fly off at any time. Barely controlled chaos that lent itself well to vindictive play. If a couple of you were pulling it off, flying round the bends without coming off, boy was it tense!



The one with the rolls of wallpaper

Two, three or even four of you could get stuck in these for hours, with only the sound of your cars bouncing off the interior walls to guide you! More fun than it sounds.



Yeah, it was a great game. '96 was great too - probably better, really, since it had more levels and a track designer and stuff, but all my fondest memories are with Turbo Tournament. Turbo Tournament also had better menu music, for what that's worth.

I remember really enjoying V3 on PlayStation, too, which played really well, and had great graphics. It was really cool at the time how you navigated the menus by controlling a car driving down a track, too. In fact, it still looks pretty cool, as you can see from QC's screenshot above. I've not played that since it was contemporary though, so my memories are hazy.

I really think that the whole design of the series' gameplay - the idea that you'd fall off all the time, a kind of endless 'winner stays on' to see who could survive the longest and accrue the most points the most quickly for doing so - was really clever, and made the games far more enjoyable and memorable than if they had just been straight racers.

Unfortunately, Codemasters have been unable to recapture the magic in recent years. I did buy and play Toybox Turbos on PS3 as soon as it came out, eager for some classic Micro Machines action. It was awful! Slow, dull, clunky, with poor track design and uninspired graphics. I had a couple of mates and we turned it off, dragged the Wii out, plugged that in, and got back on Turbo Tournament. It was pretty stark how much better and more fun it was.

A wonderful series of games though. Love the 90s entries

[samanosuke]

Oh yes, the sponge bath level!!! That was sooooo funny.

Another classic which I think was TT but might’ve been V3 was a tank level that I think was on a kitchen table setting. I figured out the reverse gear was as quick as the forward gear so me being me used to do the track in reverse gear meaning that whenever I was ahead, I could bomb the chasing pack as my gun was facing the other way.

[Neon Ignition]

Yeah, Toybox Turbos looked like it was going to be a great side entry to these games but very quickly there's a disconnect there when you start playing. On paper these should be pretty simple to make but it goes to show how well the Micro Machines entries were made.

[Neon Ignition]

Snap questions:

01 - For the sake of discussions, does the format change in the opening post make a difference?
02 - Preferable with or without mid-week teases as to the topic of the next thread?

[cutmymilk]

Yes, these are clearly difficult to pull off. An uprezzed version of 96 on modern consoles would go down well, I feel.

[wakka]

Snap questions:

01 - For the sake of discussions, does the format change in the opening post make a difference?
02 - Preferable with or without mid-week teases as to the topic of the next thread?

01 - Not much of a discernible effect on discussion IMO. I enjoyed reading them but appreciate they are time consuming to create, and it must be annoying when you only get a couple of responses to certain franchises.

02 - The midweek teases are fun! I don't think they have a discernible effect on discussion level either but I enjoy them.

And yes, I think making these games well is very hard. Turbo Tournament and 96 are deceptively brilliant in their design. They make it look easy, and it really isn't.