Original Release: Phoenix Games, PlayStation 2, 2005
A budget title from a longtime shovelware publisher that is as good as those things would lead you to believe
Doomsday Racers (PS2, Phoenix Games, 2005)
Where to Buy: eBay
How to Emulate: PlayStation 2 Emulation Guide
Review by: C. M0use
When you’re picking through budget discs on the PS2, here and there you do find a surprising treat. Doomsday Racers is not one of those happy occasions. It is instead a very low-effort racer that looks like a project from a kid in game design school, inexplicably shoveled out as a commercial title (and even at $5 or $10 it isn’t even worth the money).
The game’s sparse menu screens funnel you right into the Doomsday Racing, which gives you only the option of a “quick race” or the game’s “tournament” mode. As it turns out, the game only consists of two huge tracks, but each level is somehow a portion of one of these tracks. What that means is technically 10 “tracks” to play, but they share one of two of the same sets of background graphics.
One of the game’s biggest offenses is teasing you with weaponry that you can’t seem to use. The promo art and loading screens show roof-mounted cannons firing lightning or something, and those cannons are included on the game models … but there seems to be no way to use them! In fact, the only buttons you seem to have are “accelerate” and “brake.”
And that “brake” button is basically useless. Even worse than teasing you with false advertising of weapons, the core gameplay is just not at all good. The brake doesn’t enable handbrake turns, so really you just ease on and off the accelerator as needed. Which is not sufficient given how easy it is to spin out inadvertently and wind up in an unrecoverable position. First of all, the tracks have a weird “half-pipe” style, the intent of which I guess was to give you a risky means to pass other racers. But riding on the half-pipe is much more likely to randomly spin you out and leave you facing in the wrong direction with the slightest of jostles. Sometimes you won’t get a choice, as the enemies can “pit maneuver” you into these things from behind – but you can’t do it to them!
Add in the droning annoying techno accompanying the action and this is just a total waste of time at any price, this is an amateur effort that should not have been released.
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