UbiSoft's Monaco Grand Prix 2

Review by Spencel Thiel

This might be the best-looking most realistic racing game I have ever played. The sound and graphics rival the best arcade games. This game offers tons of different tracks, scenarios, cars, drivers, levels of play, and supports internet play. You could play this game for months and never get bored.

On the first screen of the game, you have the choice of choosing a modern day cars or classic cars. I picked the modern and started out with just a few laps around the track on the easy mode to get warmed up. I then decided it was race time. My first race wasn't too bad, so I decided I'd step up to regular mode and test my driving skills. In easy mode, the features are cut down, there are no pit stops, no damage to your car, and the cars are very difficult to crash. But like most games that feature an arcade mode, the regular mode turns out to be much more difficult and nears impossibility without hours of practice. Don't get me wrong, I still think that this game rocks, but it is extremely frustrating to never be able to get around the track without crashing. Fortunately, the game gives you complete control over the sensitivity of the steering, brakes, accelerator, and more. If you mess around with the options enough, you can make the car much easier to control.

The internet play for this game is extremely smooth, and I was glad to find that other players crash as much as I do. This game is filled with other options that I haven't even been able to explore. After a race, you can review your car's perfomance lap by lap and then make the appropriate changes to your car so that, for instance, has more grip.

One downside to this game is that you have to have a 3Dcard. I found that I had to mess around with the settings quite a bit in order to make the graphics work correct. If you are not familiar with the settings of your computer, you might have some trouble making the game work correct.

If you are a big fan of race games, a highly-skilled game player, and you like realistic game play, this game is a must have. If however, you prefer more arcade-style games and care less about realism, I'd recommend that you skip this game and go out and find an old copy of Pole Position.

I'd strongly recommend that you download a demo of the game before you rush out and buy it. The game may be incompatible with your system. Also, you may decide that the level of play that the game offers is a little too advanced.

You can download a copy of the game from:
http://www.monacoracing.com

System Requirements:

MINIMUM SYSTEM REQUIREMENT:
*Pentium 133
*3Dcard (4Mb)
* 16 Mb RAM
* Direct X6, 16-bit sound card
* CD-Rom drive quad speed or more
* Windows 95 and 98.

RECOMMENDED:
*Pentium 166
* 3Dcard (4Mb)
* 32 Mb RAM
* Direct X6, 16-bit sound card
*CD-Rom quad speed or more
* Windows 95 and 98.