Ocean
£14.99 cass/£24.99 disk
Reviewer: Andy Ide

Whoops. Bit of a case of deja vu here. Remember last ish we splashed out on a corkendous Complete Guide To Driving Sims, with all the usual mini-reviews, revised percentages and wotnot? Well, guess what's just plonked itself rather smugly onto my desk. That's right - a driving game compilation! With Chase HQ, Hard Drivin', Power Drift AND Turbo OutRun! (Cripes.)

Actually, it's not as bad as that - JD only covered a couple of them. "Very, very good" exclaimed the YS lonely heart about Chase, giving it a whopping 93° (and very deservedly too), while "state-of-the-art" Hard had to settle for a slightly more modest 84°. If you want to read the full reviews check out last issue. In the meantime, let's take a look at the other two, eh?

POWER DRIFT

"81°" said Whistlin' Rick, and, by Jingo, that's what it got. Reviewed back in January, it's a road-roller based on an old Sega arcade game, with you grasping the sweaty steering-wheel of a dune uggy as you battle it out against 12 opponents. Cars zoom in and out of lanes, the ever-more-difficult bends gobble you up with frustrating regularity, and with a total of 25 tracks it's ail a lot of fun. It does have some slightly dodgy collision detection, but it's hardly the kind of duffer you usually get stuck onto the end of compilations. In fact, it's rather spiffy actually.
'90 Rating: 81°

TURBO OUTRUN
If any of the games deserve such an ignominious accolade it'd be this US Gold sequel to OutRun, which received a meagre 70° by David in February. Alterations to the rolling-road original include 16 snowy/rainy/sunny courses, bumps, barriers and a temperamental Ferrari F-40 engine that gets mighty narked off if you heat it up too much. But 'Turbo'? More like 'Turdo' - all you get is a plume of smoke and some pitiful acceleration! The view from behind your car doesn't help either, often obscuring the opponents you can bump into (which look about half the sprite-size anyway!), and there's an unhealthy dose of bad collision detection and glitchy graphics. Why couldn't they have bunged in Stunt Car Racer instead?
'90 Rating: 70°

You can't argue that these games aren't bang up-to-date. With the exception of Turbo OutRun, each was a competitor in the frantic big-bucks run-up to last Christmas, since when there's been a surprising dearth of vroom-vroom releases. It's therefore impossible to compare them against any contemporary standard (so Chase still leads the pack). All the top-notch 1990 products like Days Of Thunder, Lotus Esprit Turbo Challenge and Chase HQ's sequel SCI are sitting tight for Santa in much the same way as these games were last year, so until they come out these are just about the best driving games you're gonna get. Definitely good value, your interest will depend on which of them you've already got.

Title: Wheels of Fire
Label: Domaric
Price: £14.99

If you don't quickly TYRE of racing games, this compilation could DRIVE you crazy! WHEELS OF FIRE is a WHEELY comprehensive collection from Ocean, Domark, Activision and US Gold in which the star is probably TURBO OUTRUN - sequel to the classic Sega coin-op. This time, you get 16 stages, choice of auto or manual gearshift, more opposition and a turbo boost option.

Fairly decent is CHASE HQ; it's visually similar to Turbo Outrun, but has an action element as you attempt to overhaul motorised crooks. Next along is POWER DRIFT, an extremely fast and frantic kart-racing sim with 27 tracks. The big gimmick here is that the track bobs UP and DOWN in an extremely nauseating manner. Trailing a poor fourth is HARD DRIVING, which is equally nauseating but for different reasons. This solid vector graphic 3-D sim is so slow, it looks like a graphic adventure game. This one wasn't released - it escaped, and the ironic bit is that this is Domark's contribution to the package. You really have to be a driving maniac to go for this compilation, especially since Hard Driving drags down the overall mark so much.