Checkered Flag
SCORE: 52
One of Atari’s many bankruptcies came from the Atari Jaguar. I bought a system many years ago when stores were trying to just get rid of inventory. Did not do much with it since then. Recently tried to do some video capture. We are not set up to capture coaxial output yet. Something we are still working on. Part of the build up for hopeful video capture was a recent purchase of Checkered Flag on the Atari Jaguar. Thanks to Checkered Flag I can see why the Atari Jaguar failed so quickly.
The controls in Checkered Flag are horrible. Part of it is the clunky controller, and the other part is poor controls. Checkered Flag feels like Pole Position slightly enhanced. Retro gamers can tell you that was an insult. The computer controlled cars will beat you unmercifully over and over again. How are they making those turns? I call hacks.
The graphics in Checkered Flag are not that great. I understand the polygon look, and this is a retro game. With all of that applied Checkered Flag still looks bad. Virtua Racing looks better than Checkered Flag. What makes matters worse is the price tag of the games on the Atari Jaguar were way too high for the time. They are too high for a brand new game now. Thankfully I got Checkered Flag for under twenty dollars. Even at that I think I paid too much money.
There are ten tracks, and a decent array of options. We can pick the color, weather, airfoil, tires, gearing, drones, race, laps, and track in Checkered Flag. Most of those options make Checkered Flag an even harder game to play. I bounced around like a ping pong ball between the walls on good driving conditions. When it got bad, I could not even finish the laps.
I always liked Atari back in the day. I find it sad that Checkered Flag was such a poorly designed, developed, and polished video game. Pole Position is more entertaining than Checkered Flag. With all of that said I really would like a sequel to Checkered Flag. Something that cleans up the problems.
I strongly recommend that our readers avoid Checkered Flag. Collectors will take an interest in the Atari Jaguar. Families and casual gamers should definitely pass on this system and this game.
- Paul
UPDATE: Video Capture of this game has been performed.
Graphics: 50%
Sound: 70%
Replay/Extras: 50%
Gameplay: 20%
Family Friendly Factor: 70%
System: Atari Jaguar
Publisher: Atari
Developer: Atari
Rating: ‘K-A’ - Kids to Adults
{Ages 6+}
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