Beetle Adventure Racing

Released in North America for the Nintendo 64 on March 23, 1999 by Electronic Arts, and developed by Paradigm Entertainment and EA Canada, Beetle Adventure Racing features arcade style racing on huge, 3D tracks

As much as I love racing games, I am also terrible at racing games. I love the sense of speed, I love ramming my opponents off the track, I love winning. However, due to my lack of skill, I fare much better with arcade style racers than I do with simulation style (i.e. more realistic) racing games. Imagine my joy when Electronic Arts announced an arcade style racing game that also incorporates the exploration of classic Nintendo 64 3D platforming titles like Super Mario 64 and Banjo Kazooie! I was thrilled, and picked up Beetle Adventure Racing! in March 1999, the week it was released. I absolutely adored the game and played it nonstop for months, until I had unlocked every track and car, every battle arena, discovered all its secrets, and introduced it to and played it with all of my friends. As the era of the Nintendo 64 passed, the game was always close to my heart, though truthfully, at least to me, the era of the Nintendo 64 will NEVER pass. For the game's 25th anniversary, I've dusted off my original copy of Beetle Adventure Racing!, started a new file, and played it all the way through. Does it still bring the same joy as it did 25 years ago?

Bursting through your screen!

Power up the Beetle Adventure Racing cartridge, and it's immediately apparent that by 64-bit standards, the game both looks and sounds great. Graphics are bright and vibrant. The cars here are obviously modeled after late 90s Volkswagen Beetles, and they're a brilliant blend of cartoon and realism, full of details like working tail lights, reflective paint jobs and windows, and tires that leave skid marks and rising smoke on the asphalt. Ram into another car and sparks fly. The tracks look great, featuring such variety as the English countryside, a snowy mountain, a jungle island, a vast city, and more. The tracks are all huge, feature dozens of short cuts, and hundreds of tiny, specific details. Single-player championship mode features eight cars on the track, and the sense of speed is absolutely blazing fast, despite the huge, detailed tracks, the amount of action appearing onscreen, and the fact that the game doesn't require an Expansion Pak. Textures mostly avoid blurriness, and the game even features environmental effects like snow, smoking fire and lava, and splashes and tire spray when a car drives through water, as well as excellent lighting and shadow effects. With all the speed, detail, and miraculously high framerate, the tradeoff is a small amount of draw-in, meaning that very distant objects will suddenly draw into view. Considering the otherwise high quality here, a minor amount of draw-in feels like a small price to pay.

This game screams I'M SPECIAL! from the start

Beetle Adventure Racing's sound design is equally excellent. This is obvious from the moment the bass groove hits on the menu screen, followed by the drums, and a fun melody from an organ. The hip breakbeat soundtrack, spearheaded by the late Phil Western, flows throughout the entirety of the game, from the menu screen, to a unique and fitting individual track for each of the game's massive six...tracks...wow, how great is it that track can mean both a musical song AND a course to race upon? That's deep! Sound effects are great, from engines, to unique vehicle horn sounds, to the sound of crunching metal, to tires squealing. There's even a fun and enthusiastic announcer who doesn't outstay his welcome. The overall sound package here is excellent.

Sound even echoes when you're in an enclosed space

Thankfully, Paradigm also put in some serious work with the game's control system, as well. The handling here is excellent, even with the game's earlier cars. The cars' response to the 64 controller joystick feels calibrated to perfection. Acceleration and braking are perfectly fine-tuned, are the game's hand-braking and drifting systems. With that said, and as I mentioned before, the physics here are definitely arcade-based more than simulation. Fun is the goal over realism, though realism isn't completely abandoned. The balance here is perfect.

I think black with silver stripes is my favorite car design in the game

Beetle Adventure Racing! features the standout graphics, sound, and controls that characterize the 64's platforming greats. But how well does it blend those platforming aspects with the gameplay?

Well... Beetle Adventure Racing! immediately unveils its hybrid charms. The first race takes place in the British countryside, with hot air balloons taking flight at the starting line. The track immediately winds over a stone bridge, past some enormous waterfalls, and through a small rural village...and suddenly the player has options. They can drive straight...but is that an alleyway behind the phone booth on the right? Can a car fit there? What about that side-alley between the shops on the left? After getting through the village and jumping through the air over a canal, there's a railroad tunnel on the right...could you drive through there? What about that barn up ahead? Could you ram your car through its doors? 

How'd I end up in a movie theater?...also, I love this game's weird alien throughline!

Each track unfolds like a wonderful box of mysteries, not like a lame JJ Abrams mystery box that has nothing inside, but one that continuously rewards the player's curiosity. Usually in Beetle Adventure Racing!, just like in the platformers from which it takes influence, if you can see something, you can drive there. A new found path might be a shortcut...or it might contain hidden items and loot. All the while, the player is racing other cars at a high speed. It's a brilliant experience. The only way to do it justice is to give a quick track-by-track review.

For anyone who claims Nintendo 64 hasn't aged well, this game is on its way to arrest you

Coventry Cove: Your perfect intro track, with a lot of space to work on the fundamentals and not quite as many tough turns or shortcuts to worry about. Still a lengthy track, full of secrets, and beautiful 64-bit sights, from the aforementioned waterfalls and hot air balloons, to ancient ruins and rolling, hilly countryside

One of my favorite moments in any Nintendo 64 game

Mount Mayhem: My favorite course in any racing game, this snowy mountain features an alpine village, a ski jump, ice caves, slippery glaciers, and tons of twisting side paths. It also features its own little ongoing story, as helicopters fly overhead at the start, then reappear over a bridge later on; the bridge has a hole in the side where something wrecked through, and if the player drives off at that spot, they jump past one of the helicopters, into a secret cave where a UFO has crashed. I miss the 90s alien craze, but I love that later on, the UFO shows up again on a screen in a later course's movie theater shortcut, and that late in the game, you can earn and then drive the alien's personalized tie dyed Beetle. My favorite part of Mount Mayhem comes near its finish line. Every track in this game is composed of three laps. Near the end of the third lap, every track redirects to a special final stretch. Mount Mayhem is shrouded in snow and icy fog, but the final stretch sees the driver reach a high altitude, as the highway wraps around the top of the mountain, and the car bursts through the fog, revealing distant forest valleys below. It's exhilarating! The music for this course is also my favorite, a chiming, upbeat, kitschy throwback with a wintry flair, that conjures the late 90s retro fascination with the 50s, 60s, and 70s, and even includes a few alienesque tones in honor of the course's special guests. Overall, Mount Mayhem is not just my favorite course in a racing game, but one of my favorite areas and experiences in any Nintendo 64 game.

Welcome to Jurassic...Beetle Adventure Racing!

Inferno Isle: Features a fun, Jurassic Park-inspired electric fence and T-Rex segment, a secret swamp village, a quaint old island town, a fort, another waterfall, and an active volcano that erupts just in time for the final stretch of the race.

It's an expedition!

Sunset Sands: From an oasis to the desert, to the outside, to the inside of a pyramid and ruins, this Ancient Egypt-themed race is one of the game's most challenging.

 

Nothing like a nice evening drive in the city

Metro Madness: An enormous city, featuring the most split paths, shortcuts and secrets of any course in the game. With the amount of buildings, lights, and cars on screen in this enormous 3D environment, it's near shocking that there's no framerate slowdown here, even when you're kicking up spray from puddles reflecting the sunset. I love this track.

The atmosphere's so thick, you can drive through it!

Wicked Woods: The reward for getting first place on every championship level, this Halloween/horror-themed track is a great prize for mastering the rest of the courses. Under a haunted sky, the player drives through creepy woods, an ominous clock tower, a dragon's cave, an autumnal town, infernal plains, and a fun, blacklit Halloween village. I also love that the game's six courses are essentially a progression through a day, as the opening courses take place in the morning through midday, the later courses feature a progressively setting sun, and the final course takes place at night.

The fabled Mount Mayhem UFO cave!

When the game begins, the player only has access to the first two tracks, and three cars. One car has better acceleration, one better top speed, and one better control (the player can customize the colors for all the cars in the game, save the final two bonus cars). A new track is unlocked once each difficulty of championship circuit is completed. In the higher difficulties, the opponent AI and car quality not only increases, but the player will have to compete in more races--the highest difficulty circuit features every race in the game. As in most racing games, higher points are awarded for a higher finish, and the car with the most points at circuit's end is the champion. Winning a circuit doesn't just unlock a new track, though. With each unlocked circuit, the player is awarded with three new cars, each with distinctive markings like a spoiler, stripes, designs, etc., though each new batch of cars follows the same pattern of one with better acceleration, one with higher top speed, and one with better handling, just with higher stats as each new difficulty level is unlocked. Unlock the highest difficulties, though, and you'll unlock a weird alien Beetle, and finally, the best vehicle, a police car whose horn (this game features a car honk button!) is a siren that causes all nearby cars to stop!

The best car in the game

There's far more to this game than winning championships, though. There's also a single race mode AND a time attack mode. Both of these modes are integral for exploring the game's vast tracks at the player's leisure, so that they can utilize the secrets they've learned during championship mode and that's because: 

The most fun aspect of the single-player mode in this game takes another page from the great 3D platformers of the era...for what's a big 3D platforming adventure without an accompanying collectathon?! 

That's right, each track in the game contains hidden boxes worth either two, five, or ten points (the higher the points, the better they're hidden) scattered throughout, adding up to 100 points for each course. Collect a certain amount of these in each course to unlock a continue, which can be used when the player has placed too low in a track on championship mode and received a game over. HOWEVER, if a player retrieves all 100 points during a given race on a course, they'll unlock a new arena in the game's battle mode. Battle mode?!

Battle mode!

Coventry Cove cops have got nothing to do but race! (Notice the waterfalls are still flowing in two-player mode)

Yes! Many Nintendo 64 games tried to get in on the multiplayer fun found in top tier titles like Goldeneye 64 and Mario Kart 64. Few succeeded in creating something any group of friends would want to play for more than 15 minutes before just putting the Goldeneye or Mario Kart cartridge back into their 64s. Beetle Adventure Racing! is one of those few. Its Battle mode is an absolute blast. Players (up to 4!) can pick up weapons like rockets and bombs and blast each other, while in pursuit of colored ladybugs found throughout the arena (easily found through the mode's helpful radar screen). If a player takes too much damage and has their health meter completely depleted, their car will explode. They'll reappear in the arena seconds later, but as a result, they'll lose the last ladybug they've collected. Thus, there's a fun balance between trying to get each ladybug, trying to stop other players from getting ladybugs, and not getting blown up yourself. It's one of the best multiplayer experiences on the system and gives Beetle Adventure Racing!, whose single player is already worth the price of admission, even more value. Just want to race your friends instead of blowing them up and fighting for ladybugs? You can do that too! Up to four players, and the game still performs great. I mean, personally, I'd rather blow up my friends and steal their ladybugs, but racing is also fun.

The Alien Beetle!...but also, metaphorically, this game...cuz it's a winner

But hey, any good collectathon features more than one type of collectible item! Only the most dedicated and adventurous players will find the game's deepest secret items, mysterious flower boxes that contain cheats and other new game options. You'll want to make sure you have a memory card to save all of your progress as you do (no battery-backed saving to the cartridge), as well as your best course times.

The value, ingenuity, and effort put into this game are astounding. Beetle Adventure Racing! is truly a gem, a spectacularly fun and original game with both high production and incredible replay values. It's a standout game that absolutely no Nintendo 64 fan's collection should be without.

SCORE BREAKDOWN

Graphics: 9.2/10 -- Cars, tracks, and lighting and environmental effects look great, and the game runs smoothly, with a little draw-in as the only tradeoff.

Music and Sound: 9.5/10 -- Pitch-perfect breakbeat soundtrack, great car sounds, and an overall excellent sound design.

Gameplay: 9.5/10 -- Clever, ingenious, and nearly perfectly executed blend of breakneck, arcade racing and 3D platforming.

Lasting Value: 9.0/10 -- Six huge courses full of secrets and alternate paths and addictive multiplayer modes enjoyably inflate the replay value.

Final Score (Not an Average): 9.5/10