Sprintmaster
SCORE: 72
Sprintmaster is another Atari 2600 game I was able to play thanks to
the Atari Collection 2 cartridge on the Evercade system. Again this is
another reason to be thankful for the Evercade and the cartridge
compilations being released on that system. I see so much potential for
this system in the coming years.
Sprintmaster is a top down racing video game where we see the cars
and the entire track. Since it is limited to the screen you can expect
smaller tracks.
The options families have with Sprintmaster is one or two players,
bouncing or crashing, and how many laps they would like to race.
Graphically Sprintmaster definitely shows its age. There are nine tracks
available to families within Sprintmaster. Some of those tracks have
walls that vanish for short periods of time. If you can time it just
right then you can take those short cuts. If you miss it then you will
have a serious problem.
The controls within Sprintmaster take some getting used to. There are
certainly enough tracks for families to replay Sprintmaster multiple
times. Once I beat a track I had little interest in going back to it.
Maybe that is just me though. You might like going around and around in
that first circular track over and over again. If you do then you might
want to look into Nascar.
There are power ups on the track that will speed you up or slow you
down. These are color coded. So the red car wants to go over red objects
to do better. The blue car wants to go over the blue objects. If you are
the red car and you go over the blue items then it will slow you down.
The same thing happens if you go off the track. At least with the bounce
option turned on. I never did mess with the crash.
I remember the era of these kinds of racers. They were not my favorite
games. The controls in Sprintmaster can be a real pain at times. I found
plenty of frustration from playing Sprintmaster. I think this game was
an attempt by Atari to catch up with games like R.C. Pro-Am.
Sprintmaster is just not in the same league which is sad to report.
Atari did the best they could. Graphically Sprintmaster is lagging. The
music is nice though.
- Paul
Graphics: 60%
Sound: 80%
Replay/Extras: 90%
Gameplay: 60%
Family Friendly Factor: 70%
System: Atari 2600/Evercade
Publisher: Atari
Developer: Atari
Rating: ‘NR’ - Not Rated
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