Review by: Shawn Quigley
Published: October 2, 1997

Since the first Test Drive game came out many years ago, players have been eager to go faster and faster in computer racing games. With the recent development in hardware, especially in the area of graphics, game producers have been able to portray the feeling of speed with better and faster games. Electronic Arts is publishing one of the only motorcycle racing simulations to be found on the PC. The title is called Moto Racer. What sets Moto Racer apart from other racing simulations is its lightning fast graphics and support for 3D acceleration via Direct3D.

Moto Racer is very much an arcade racing game. There are three modes of play that you can choose from in the main menu screen. The first mode of play is the practice mode. In this mode, you can race on some of the courses to get a feel for them before you go into a race against other riders. The second mode is a single race where you race against other opponents on one track. The final mode is the championship mode. Championship mode is actually a circuit of courses that requires you to place in the top three finishers to continue on to the next track. Depending on what skill level you are playing, if you finish the circuits there will be other options enabled. When finished with the Easy level, the option to race the courses in reverse in enabled. When playing on Medium level, at the end you will get the ability to play all the tracks in reverse as well as in Pocket mode. Pocket Mode is basically the same as Regular mode, except all the players ride on Pocket bikes, or miniaturized versions of the larger bikes. The hardest level of difficulty does not give any new options if you finish the circuit. The final feature that Moto Racer has is the ability to race against a ghost image of yourself after you have finished races. This is fun way to try and beat yourself in races.

There are eight courses that come with Moto Racer. These eight courses vary from each other based on two elements. The first element is the location of the course and the second element is whether the course is a dirt bike course or a racing bike. The eight courses are, Speed Bay, Snow Ride, West Way, Dirt Arena, Rock Forest, Lost Ruins, Red City, and Great Wall. By allowing you to race these courses in reverse, there are basically 16 different tracks to race. Each course has its own challenges and scenery, making them very different from each other. For example, the Speed Bay course becomes the easiest course to race once you know when to turn, whereas the Red City course has much more difficult turns in it that require you to alter your speed to avoid hitting the walls. The courses that use the racing bikes are the most fun, and offer the best portrayal of speed. You can watch other bikers pass by, or buildings and other scenery blur as you speed by.

Playing Moto Racer is very simple. When the race starts there really are only a couple of controls to maneuver your bike around the tracks. If you are using the keyboard, which I found the best, you simply use the left and right arrow keys to turn and the up and down keys to accelerate and brake. There is another key that you can use and the is the “b” key. This key allows you to do turbo boosts to gain some ground and it also doubles as a stunt or trick key. When racing on the dirt tracks where you get a lot of air, you can press the “b” key to do tricks or, when racing down a straightaway, you can press the key to do wheelies. There are other keys that can be accessed during play that allow you to change the different options within Moto Racer, such as the graphic detail or your current viewpoint. There are a couple of different viewpoints that you can choose from, with the most exciting one being the first-person view. From this view, you see over your handlebars as if you where actually sitting on the bike. This becomes a challenge when playing on the dirt tracks since things bump around quit a bit, but it does give a great feel for riding a bike on a dirt track.