Wave Race 64 review by Tyson

Overall

Buy

     I found Wave Race 64 to be a fun jet-ski racing game. While the graphics haven’t held up overtime but the gameplay on the other hand has held up very well. If you are looking for a fun and unique racing game for your Nintendo 64 then you need to add this game to your collection.


Gameplay

     Wave Race 64 is a jet-ski r acing game that includes a few fun gimmicks in its gameplay. The main gimmick is how the water interacts with your jet-ski. Waves will have you bobbing up and down or sliding around. A big part of the game is finding out how to handle the various waves as you race. I found that interacting with the water just felt right.

     While you race you not only need to be ahead of your fellow racers but pass around various buoys. As you pass buoys this will increase your max speed. Miss a buoy and you slow down. Miss too many and the race is over. Higher difficulties will also modify the buoy placement around and it gets really tough passing around them. While the buoy system might sound annoying it actually works out very well.

     Another gimmick is how each of the games 4 racers interacts with gameplay. Each racer has a speed, handling, and acceleration setting. You are also able to modify the various stats of your racer as well. Each racer will also naturally be better at certain things then another though. I really liked how you could rename the racers as well.

     I also want to comment how the tracks would have different paths open up on higher difficulties or during different laps. It really made the courses feel unique for me. I also liked how the CPU wouldn’t play perfect as they do in other racing games. I noticed the computer messing up a lot during the game even on the higher difficulties.


Control

     I had zero problems with the control in this game. The analog stick works really well when controlling your racer.


Graphics

     Wave Race 64 was a very good looking game back in 1996 but by today’s standard the water effects just aren’t very good. I noticed the draw distance on the water isn’t very far. The one aspect of the graphics I did like was the course design though. Courses looked very colorful and I liked some the graphical effects like the fog in Drake Lake.


Sound

     I came away enjoying the audio in the game. The background music was good. I didn’t find the jet-ski engine noises to annoying and I liked how the announcer would make different comments as you raced.