Developers at Bullfrog, the development house responsible for such titles as Dungeon Keeper, Magic Carpet, and Theme Hospital, are the people behind Hi-Octane, a high-speed racer set in a desolate vision of the future. Two modes of play are offered, Single Race and Championship, the latter taking players through a series of courses that includes the Amazon Delta Turnpike, Trans-Asia Interstate, Shanghai Dragon, New Chernobyl Central, Slam Canyon, and Thrak City. Points are awarded after each race and the racer with the most points and the season's end is declared the winner.
Players can choose from six vehicles, each rated in Speed, Armor, Weight, and Firepower, and sporting foreboding names like Beserker, Vampyr, and KD-1 Speeder. A selection of teams are provided and players can opt to join the likes of the Gorehounds, Fire Phreaks, or Mad Medicine, among others. The dystopian theme encourages players to attack fellow racers with the machine guns and missiles equipped on each vehicle. Fuel also plays a vital role during a race, requiring players to stop at a trackside recharge station when running low. Turbo boosts can be employed at will, but doing so burns fuel faster, requiring players to weigh the costs of such an action.
Shields and ammunition are limited and also require replenishing at supply stations. By acquiring power-ups strewn about the track, the efficiency and potency of a craft's weapons and turbo systems can be improved, though not more than three times. Should the vehicle's shields be depleted it will be destroyed, a minor time penalty will be assessed, and the player will lose any accrued power-ups.
A futuristic racing game with hover cars, in the same line as Wipeout, using a modified version of the Magic Carpet 2 engine.
Gameplay takes a straightforward approach, with the directional keys controlling the steering and throttle, and three keys to fire the minigun, missiles or charge the booster. While the minigun has unlimited ammo, both fuel, armour and missiles must be replenished by passing through some marked areas or picking up powerups in the track or by left destroyed opponents. While the vehicles float on the track they are still influenced by the ground material: they slow down on dirt and even more on water. Each track has a number of shortcuts or alternate routes that offer powerups, and some tracks feature gates and ramps that open or close randomly.
Includes 9 tracks and several game modes (for Saturn owners and PC players with the 1.2 patch installed) such as single race mode (with option to change the number of laps), a Championship mode, Split Screen, Clone Race (beating the ghost of the best race time), Death Match (Where instead of finishing first what matters is finish alive and with the most kills) and Hot Seat, where up to eight players can compete in the same race by taking turns, with the computer taking control of the players' vehicles waiting for their turn. There are six hover cars to choose from: the fast Flexiwing and Outrider, the balanced KD-1 Speeder and Vampyr and the slow but armed to the teeth Berserker and Jugga. In addition to the natural capacity of each, their Minigun, Missle and Booster capacities can be upgraded by picking up powerups during the race. There are Eight teams to choose from, which change the colour of the vehicle: Mad Medicine (white), Bullfrog (aqua green), Storm Riders (purple), Fire Phreaks (orange), DethFest (blue), Foo Fighters (yellow), Gorehounds (red) and Assassins Anonymous (black).
This is a very fast-paced racing-game where your goal is to win (ofcourse), either by sheer driving skills, or by blowing the other drivers to bits with your minigun or your missiles, enough times for them to get slowed down. Actually, it's not normal cars, it's hovercrafts of some sort... but very fast ones. "Cruise" around the tracks wasting other drivers, picking up boosters to make your weapons better, and use your turbobooster to get ahead.
The game has great and fast graphics, and it's actually one of the fastest games i have ever played. Worth a look!
How to run this game on modern Windows PC?
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