Wave Race 64 Review
My first experience with Wave Race 64 was in the game zone of a McDonald's restaurant.
Not exactly the best place to fully immerse yourself in a game like this.
But since I have gone back and played Wave Race 64 to see what all the fuss is about,
and I am definitely convinced that Wave Race 64 is a great game to play through.
Wave Race 64 was released back in 1996 for the Nintendo 64 game console.
In Wave Race 64 you race jet-ski's against other racers to try to win races.
It's a pretty simple concept but works really well.
You can choose from one of four different Jet Skiers, but I always have to go with my
boy Miles Jeter, representing back home for Canada!
There are five different game modes that you can play in Wave Race 64.
There is the championship mode which allows you to race against the other races over a
series of races to win the race championship.
There is a warm up mode where you hop in the jet ski and practice how to drive the jet
ski over water and stuff.
There is a basic time trial mode which allows you to go through the courses in Wave Race
64 and try to get the best time possible.
An interesting stunt mode where you can hop in and drive one lap around these courses
to try to accumulate as many stunt points as possible by doing tricks like handstands
or backflips.
Back Flip!
Did a back flip!
As well in Wave Race 64 there is your basic two player versus mode where you can team
up with a friend and duke it out head to head in a race across all the different maps that
they have for you in Wave Race 64.
If you couldn't tell already by the types of game modes included in Wave Race 64, this
is a very arcade style game.
You hop in the game, go on the races and it almost feels like you are playing on an arcade
machine, like if you lose the championship you have got to put another quarter in.
Probably the strongest feature in Wave Race 64 is how well they have managed to recreate
the water in Wave Race 64.
You race on Jet Ski's so the water physics and how it looks is very important as you
spend 100% of the game on water.
They have managed to do it so well for the N64 era.
In Wave Race 64 The water looks crisps with waves ebbing and flowing and when some bigger
waves come along you will actually launch off them like you would in real life, it makes
a lot of sense and adds a bit of a wrinkle into some of the races, trying to use the
waves to your advantage.
There is a decent variation of tracks that you can race through in Wave Race 64, some
of them even adding different weather types or different times of day changing the types
of waves that you will experience making it a whole new race.
Even though Wave Race 64 only has a certain amounts of races that you can go through,
this added element adds some variation to keep each race a little bit different every
time.
Oh wow!
That... ok... so, right...
With all of the physics and racing mechanics working as well as they do in Wave Race 64,
this game can be really punishing when you fall.
If you miss one of the buoys that you have to weave through or you accidentally hit a
wall or fall going off a jump, it's really hard to catch up.
You have to hope that one of the other racers falls to even have a chance to get back into
the game.
Now this does bring back the game a little bit because it is not like Mario Kart where
you can just get a lightning bolt or a red shell to get back in the race, but it does
keep the pressure on and keeps the races exciting and down to the wire when all four racers
are keeping there turns tight and staying in control.
In Wave Race 64 there are a couple annoyances here or there, sometimes the announcer throws
up some really stupid comments, but then again a lot of them are pretty funny as well so
it can be a little bit of a laugh to listen to from time to time.
Pretty good!
"Watch the signal!"
Thanks for the advice!
Wave Race 64 is a pretty simple game.
There is not a ton of gameplay elements here to use.
You hop in the Jet Ski and race around the tracks.
But that is the beauty of Wave Race 64.
What they do have here, they have executed so well and makes for hours of fun and exciting
gameplay and for that reason, my final verdict for Wave Race 64 is a 9 out of 10.
It's an amazing game.
The level of quality that they managed to put into the racing and water elements of
Wave Race 64 for being so early in technological advancement, back in the N64 era, it's pretty
amazing.
Wave Race 64 is even fun to return to play around and try to beat the championship modes
on the hardest difficulty even today.
Well that's it for Wave Race 64 Review.
I was recently able to return and enjoy this game with the help of an emulator that I downloaded
off the internet.
If you want to see a tutorial on how to do that, click this video right here I have laid
it all out for you guys in a couple easy steps and some links as well to some great sites
that can download this so you can enjoy Wave Race 64 as well as other great games from
the Nintendo 64 era.
As well, if you want click this annotation for my Harvest Moon 64 Review, another great
game from the Nintendo 64 console.
Thank you guys for watching and we hope to see you next time on Yes Guy Gaming!
Wave Race 64 Review