F-Zero 99: so long suckers! i rev up my motorcylce and create a huge cloud of smoke.

[spines]

when the cloud dissipates im lying completely dead on the pavement

---

i realize the broad reaction is an understandable "who asked for this??" but honestly? it's pretty fun. not as clever or chaotic as mario 35 but there's a fascinating tension in boosting, and feeling the risks of lowering your health so much versus trying to pass people up and place better

the game assigns you a set of "rivals" at the start with a similar ranking to you, and they're the main people you want to stay ahead of to rank up, because placing in the top 10 is not easy. because the races are extremely finite unlike m35 and t99 it's easy to play to the end...which is why a lot of the pressure and danger comes from your own decisions about where to try and pick up the sparks and boost forward through stretches or take shortcuts over the rough patches. apparently if you get credit for a KO you heal a bunch, but i haven't managed to do that yet.

if you can choose to check it out, i think you should give it a spin. it's a decent little toy and the tutorial parts are just a few races before you can get into the actual online ones so in just 20-30 minutes or so you can easily figure out if you think it has any appeal whatsoever

 

[Octopus Prime]

Playing against other people roughly my own skill level, instead of a merciless AI really goes a long way in making F-Zero more approachable.

And the fact that almost every match is a completely impossible to parse bottleneck of rapidly moving space cars… well that’s just Good Video Games

 

[Violentvixen]

This is a fun freebie (well, free if you have the subscription but you know that I mean). I am sure I could bother to memorize the tracks and know the best time to deploy the Skyway but eh. Also looks like you can unlock various customizable skins/decals which is fun too.

 

[MetManMas]

Hey, if this is the first step towards convincing Nintendo that F-Zero has value as something other than one popular Smash fighter and a couple of Mario Kart 8 tracks, I'll play it. Once I renew my sub, anyway.

 

[RT-55J]

This is a fun game.

The physics are accurate to the original game, possibly to a fault --- they even kept the thing where using a jump plate clamps your speed down to your non-boosting maximum. In a perfect world I'd prefer if they used the physics from Maximum Velocity.

I found the CPU trainer races to be much, much easier than the real 99 races. People are brutal.

I almost finished a Grand Prix if not for a very stupid death on Silence --- I forget how brutal that course is, especially with that stupid S curve.

I like how if you die early the game sometimes takes pity on you by turning you into one of those fake cars. You're basically on autopilot, but you can move left and right to block and spin attack people. It's fun.

I think I'll make a point of enjoying this while it's still around.

 

[balder the brave]

What is the function of the L and R buttons? Don’t think this was explained in the demo.

 

[Becksworth]

Strafing or combined with left/right for tighter cornering.

 

[Violentvixen]

What is the function of the L and R buttons? Don’t think this was explained in the demo.

Use of those is on the load screen tips occasionally but I don't think was noted other than that

 

[balder the brave]

Thanks. Turns out there is a menu option where you can read all of those tips.

So far, I am topping off at 15th place. Sometimes there’s a strategic spot to use turbo to boost over rough terrain? Not sure if there’s something else I should be doing.

 

[MrBlarney]

This game has only been out for a few days and it already feels like the playerbase has gotten significantly more tricky than the first two days. I guess I should count my blessings that I was able to luck into a single race win and Grand Prix win in the first day, 'cause it's gonna take a lot more effort for me to add any more wins to my tally. From the Grand Prix I was able to participate in today, it feels like the 'meta' is focused on the Golden Fox's high recover and added boost potential, and the Wild Goose's ability to tank through the chaos. I was top-of-type in my Fire Stingray on the final GP track, but that was only good for 10th place. Gotta get that practice in.

But yeah, game feels good, SNES F-Zero is a great fit for the battle royale mechanics. The rival system also provides good motivation to push even if getting to the top 10 is a long shot. It looks like the Queen League courses are scheduled to be released by the end of the month, with the King League a few weeks after that in October. Hopefully the reception stays strong enough that we get more courses, perhaps even more machines than the original game's contents. OK, sure, there isn't really any room in the current UI for such expansion content, but there's no cost for dreaming, right? Right??

 

[Violentvixen]

Yeah, I figured that would happen, which is part of why I played a lot of it last weekend before people figured out whatever the tricks are. I'm still having fun but can tell there's a lot going on that honestly I don't care enough to figure out. I'm sure I could invest some time to figure out the best spot to boost or use the Skyway like @balder the brave mentioned but eh.

 

[balder the brave]

I watched a few videos on YouTube of tips for winning and I feel like I'm already doing them and getting somewhere between 9th place (my highest) and ~40th.

Then I watched this. This racer seems to boost very early to take a lead, then hold onto it for the whole race with very clean driving and boosting on straightaways. They have a lot of energy because they aren't getting beat up in the middle of the pack. I'm just not good enough to implement this!

 

[spines]

strategy depends a lot on vehicle, but getting out ahead of the pack is a huge deal no matter what. fire stingray can really only boost like one time per lap (plus maybe another extra one), but has the fastest regular speed and is very good at turning while unboosted, so i've watched a longtime speedrunner win literally hundreds of races by playing patiently and then holding the lead once he gets it. obviously, that's something for people who've gotten very strong and consistent in the game (or if you get super lucky and smash a couple people into the wall early on so you get an extra 2-3 boosts to pull ahead or correct mistakes with). golden fox is on the other end, since it gets lotss of boosts per lifebar and heals a ton per lap so it's easier to stay consistent with, but generally requires a ton of strategic usage of your resources to actually win with. falcon and goose are a bit more rounded i'd say, they're not as demanding to play on principle but don't have as strongly accentuated strengths either.

 

[shivam]

i played the tutorial race and it was enough to remind me that i am maybe the worst fzero player alive