Top Gear Rally - Nintendo 64 Review - HD 

I have to disagree with this review. i I find the game quite charming.

What? No way! The music on this game was fantastic, and it used stereo in a way I had never heard before. When I was a kid, my 28 inch TV didn't support stereo output by default, so I had to sometimes use the left channel, and sometimes the right channel to listen to "different" versions of the songs, and when I enabled stereo it was like listening to both tunes at the same time! Barry Leitch did a great job on these (though... I played the North American release, apparently it had different music for Japan and Europe, but this video shows a familiar tune.) In any case, this was the third most played racing N64 game of my childhood, after Mario Kart and Diddy Kong Racing, and it was a lot of fun. Indeed after playing it again a decade later it felt like... slow motion (like you said!) specially after playing Trackmania.

I honestly think this is one of those games that you just gotta get lost in. The music isn't actually bad, but kind of hypnotic I thought. When I mean get lost, I mean drive, listen to the music, hit a trance, and keep going while in a trance. LOL

I usually tend to agree with your reviews, but I really think you didn't do this game due diligence. In my opinion, Top Gear Rally is one of the greatest racing games on the N64 (but then again, I also consider WipEout 64 one of my top 5 N64 games of all time so apparently I'm crazy or something). TGR isn't supposed to be a hard core rally sim like TGR2, but rather a rally-themed arcade racing game of the overtake-everyone variety (where you start at the back of the pack and have 3 laps to pass everyone). The gameplay feels floaty at first, but with enough practice you can throw your car around the corners like you're Colin McRae (I almost always play racing games from the first-person perspective because it gives much better control of the car, and TGR is no exception). The music is amazing when listened to in stereo, so much so that at one point I downloaded the entire soundtrack to my iPod for listening on the go. I picked up this game from my local video store when they were purging their remaining N64 inventory; since then I have gone back to this game dozens of times and not once have I been disappointed.

I'm the comolete opposite. I love the music, the driving feels like a real rally car, and if you feather the throttle and break you can play it properly. The fact that this doesn't have the feeling of most arcade racers, stuck to the track, almost on rails, is what I love about it. I remember countless hours spent playing this game. Again, the music is what I love about it and just the overall feel. Sadly, when I was a kid I never had the game pak so I could never save. So I'd either leave the system on all the time, or just work as hard as I could yo unlock as much as I could in a first go around.

I loved having the ability to customize my cars paint job.

I think going back to a lot of N64 games has disappointed me, not because they've aged badly, but more as I didn't remember how incredibly blurry the N64 was, to the point where some games are almost unplayable now. Also, this must be a really common game as over my years of collecting N64 games, I've got a good 4-5 copies of Top Gear Rally. Aannnd, great timing on releasing a Top Gear review ^_-

Why is the music so good?!

I enjoyed this because the melancholy/moody music mixed with the weather patterns let me imagine I was on my way to a relative's house or some other place new and exciting. I remember a tornado warning was in effect while I was in the backseat on the way home from getting Pokemon Red, and that feeling of traveling through inclement weather to a safe haven has always been a fond memory

Lovedd this game when it came out in Fall of 97. Remembered getting it for Christmas that year. Used to spend hours racing through the tracks and winning the races. It had its flaws but it was still an early n64 game looking back on it now. Only complaints I had were that the races were a bit long and every car sounded the same. The track design was ahead of its time though imo.

your nuts i played the game pure for the music man its really emotional

Something perfect about your reviews on my absolute favorite system... keep em coming and thanx

SEGA Rally Championship will always be the best rally game ever made.

i do not agree with this review i loved this game as a kid but it was hard, but gowing ups around cars and and actually racing in real rally's i found this to be a really good game to come back to, yes the physics are not perfect but for a game of the era are really good, throwing a car the way you would in a real rally actually work in this game, i love it, it makes you drive in a way that you have to be smooth but rewards you for driving scando which is how i drive in a rwd setup, i have not found a game that has this level of feel even now, this does not feel like a acade game more a simulator that was to advanced for its time, which dose let it down there are flaws and it not a true simulation experience but for the n64 is bloody good

Disagree on the 1 car thing. It was great constantly "catching up" to the next car. It made the game push you and feel a sense of time attack.

I actually like this game quite a bit and I really love many of the songs in the soundtrack. However, it's by no means perfect. I was able to find a control method that suited me and was able to adapt to the controls and physics without too much effort, but that certainly won't be the case for everyone.

For perspective, I played this game when I was not even 5 years old yet and remember it fondly.

I loved this game. Yeah, there are better rally games now, but this was a game changer back in the day. The instant replays alone were bar none.

I have seen several of your videos and have liked them so far. Keep up the good work. As for Top Gear Rally, I played the hell out of it and unlocked everything back when I got it for my N64.

Not going to lie, it still holds up visually. It's a very beautiful N64 game with beautiful music. But those floaty controls...

Dreamed of playing this game back in the day but couldn't afford it.

I don't particularly like rally games or racing games, but I used to LOVE playing this when I was a kid. I'd spend ages spraying my own designs on cars and then go find the secret route on the beach. Gonna have to find a copy!

Top Gear Rally is a game that has the exact OPPOSITE memories for me. Prior to Top Gear Rally, I could go into a store and purchase a game based strictly on the cover, take it home, and have a good time. But when I picked this one up, I understood that something had either changed with me or with gaming in general. I would spend the next several years feeling like I had to rent games before giving them a full purchase. I suspect it simply wasn't the kind of game I was looking for. Hot on the heels of games like Wave Race 64 and Mario Kart 64, there's just something unbelievably slow and bland about this game. For fans of rally racing it probably fit the bill, but for me it was just BORING. However, it doesn't help matters that this happened right around the time I started to suffer from clinical depression, a problem that would go completely undiagnosed for almost two years. So even the games that came out on the console which were GOOD couldn't hold my interest the way they should have. Even Zelda: Ocarina of Time ended up being a disappointment to me, despite it being more fun than many of the other games on the system. So what is the legacy of Top Gear Rally in my experience? It was the first sign I was suffering from a psychological disorder. That's not something to be proud of in any capacity, and I'm glad I got rid of it a year later. LOL :)

This game is one of the best racers on the system. The music is also very impressive considering how limited bgm was on the system. They did a great job transitioning it from the generic tunes of the 80s and early 90s into proper house and trance.

Still love this game. Solid challenge.

I mean the game was fair it wasn't awful it's still one of the only n64 games I can pick up and play for hours

This game reminds me of something funny. I used to play some games like this one as if it was real life. Id stop at apartment looking buildings or farm houses (if you knew where to look) to pretend i was picking somebody up or maybe even lived there. I wonder if kids these days still do that.. with games like gta 5 to minecraft it could be easier than ever but way way back in the day there was nothing like pulling over to the side of a track to pretend you were part of that world. That you lived in it. Fun memories.

Are the game cartridges for this Valuable?

Finding great games you missed out on as a kid is one of the best parts of this hobby. For Snes I played Chrono Trigger for the first time as an adult and loved it. Rocket Knight Adventures for Mega Drive same thing. For PlayStation I discovered the joys of Chrono Cross and for the Nintendo 64 I discovered loads I never played as a kid from Banjo to Conker to Majoras Mask. Nowadays though, I've gone from emulation to gettimg the actual machines again, and this time armed with good headphones and a small desktop Sony BVM i am rediscovering old classics in a much more immersive way as well as finding great games that have no past bias at all they are just great games now that I did not get to experience or appreciate back then. And I have to say as an adult that there is something to be said for just popping a game in and switching a console on and off you go not having to mess about.

There's no point in the "I disagree with you" comments in these reviews because we all have our own personal opinions based on differing experiences with games, but as I was listening to the review, I kept noticing how almost every single aspect mentioned was the exact opposite of how I felt about this game to the extent that it made me write this comment. Just in case nostalgia had distorted my feelings, I made a point of playing it again after watching this, and can confirm my opinions remain mostly the same. First and foremost, and I don't mean this as a destructive criticism, the gameplay in the footage is horrible (it's ok to be rusty, Glenn). If that's what was used to base the review on, I'd say it's not a representative example of the game. You can't beat TGR pressing A the whole time. You need to let go of the accelerator and sometimes brake. Speeding towards a turn whilst on full speed will result in the various blunders demonstrated here. The most memorable aspect of this game is clearly the physics. Not only was it revolutionary at the time, but it also made such an impression in how I judge racing games that to this day I find myself playing contemporary ones and noticing how the driving doesn't feel as good as in this 20+ year old game. You could "feel" every bump in the road through the car's reactions and adjust accordingly. There's something about it that gave the cars a sense of "solidity" as opposed to other games where cars felt like a hollow frame of polygons, if this makes any sense. The fact that the cars became damaged to the point of resembling a crushed ball of metal by the end of a race helped making you believe you really were in control of a sturdy machine. The tracks were all unique and diverse, some of them being amongst the most memorable racing tracks that I can remember of, such as Strip Mine. The fact that amongst this diversity, you could take multiple paths through them, although nothing new to racing games at this point, helps the tracks feel fresh even after completing the game. Also, the fact that you had so much freedom in taking whichever shortcuts you felt like, made this feel like an "open-world racing game", and it never failed to amaze me how when I used to play with friends, everyone always seemed to have different ways of racing the same track that no one else had thought of. Personally, I also love that the tracks were long, much as I still yearn for the long tracks of Mario Kart 64 as opposed to the short, contemporary ones. I absolutely disagree with the music comments and find the game's soundtrack brilliant. A couple of years ago I decided to import the soundtrack into my music library and listen to it frequently. Search for "Top Gear Rally OST Desert" and tell me that isn't a memorable piece of videogame music. As mentioned above, this is a hard game and you need to learn how to control the cars properly. The sensitive steering becomes necessary in the later tracks and once you get accustomed to the "twitch-steering" that's needed to negotiate their tight corners, you'll appreciate the cars' responsiveness (I also believe this is the reason why there aren't less sensitive control schemes, as this would probably make the game impossible to complete). Of course there are many aspects about it that were never good or just aged poorly: the textures were underwhelming even at the time, the lack of licensed cars made the game feel cheap (although that doesn't bother me anymore) and the fact that you could ride a wall without losing momentum was always a jarring thing to see considering how realistic the rest of the physics felt, but even this kind of became so ingrained with the gameplay that it came to be kind of a signature of this game. Of all of your game reviews so far (and I know you've done this already with some game I can't remember), I think this is the one that you need to go back and re-review the most.

The music in this game is fire

i still love this game. and the music is awesome imho, i like this kind of softness and emotion in it. and i can't aggree, in my opinion there is hardly - if not at all - any better rally game on n64.^^

To me it was the opposite. As a teen when this was released I didn't like it. I was not a big fan of realistic racing games and I'd rather play Mario Kart, Diddy or F-Zero. I found the controls very floaty with boring music and gameplay. Fast forward 20 years I got this for my N64 collection and I've been surprised how much I'm loving this game. It's not perfect but I feel it's very enjoyable and has aged very well. The music is great I love it, it's calm but beautiful, something I could listen for hours. The control yeah it's a bit floaty but with practice you get used to it, I personally prefer the smallest steering wheel for the controls. Only bad thing for me is having only 4 tracks (5 but you have to unlock it). But yeah, as an adult now I appreciate racing games more and I got a bunch for N64, this is the one I keep coming back more.

What do you think of MRC?

I just picked up the Japanese version of this. Some of the cars are actually painted like their real life counterparts, unlike the crappy textures we got in the west.

Awesome Game! And the only racing game that I know where you can paint your freaking car! There are some really talented people out there that I've seen in Nintendo Power Magazine and their creations. I still love Top Gear rally to this day!

I was given this game for Christmas back in the 90s. I thought it was awful - poor smeary graphics and floaty weird handling... it just made me wish I still had access to Sega Rally on the Saturn (I sold my Saturn to fund the N64). I think I traded this for Goldeneye in the end. Fast forward to Nov 2022 and I've just ordered an Everdrive64, so it'll be interesting revisiting this game after 25 years!

I had this game as a kid and loved it. I also had a wheel and pedals for it though. I have a copy again but haven’t played it. Afraid to ruin the memory trying to play with the n64 controller

I would say this. The cars don't feel like they turn the corners but "Flout" around them on helium

If you were to buy a N64 Racing game which one would you guys suggest?

I'm kind of surprised with your conclusion on this one! It's obvious by my own review that I really liked TGR back in the day, and still appreciate it now, but it's also interesting to see how many people have commented with how much they love the game, even today. As for a game that disappointed me on revisiting it, it would have to be Army Men Sarge's Heroes on the 64. The controls were tough to tackle back then, but going back now they're atrocious! I'm never shocked by graphics or music that doesn't hold up in old favorites, but when the mechanics or controls age poorly you know you have a dud.

I loved this game. I was super excited to get it after all the coverage it had in Nintendo Power. It was like the Dark Souls of racing games but once you got gud and learned how to handle your car rocking a custom Sailor Moon paint job (it was epic) to the incredible music was an amazing experience. The floaty controls were a problem though, especially with the fastest car on the hardest tracks.

My best childhood memories were with the N64. I remember playing this game with Golden Eye 007 next up while watching the Lion King on VHS.

I have to disagree, this was one of my favorite racing games on the N64, played it for months, TopGear overdrive was the biggest letdown in my opinion, I completed that game in ONE afternoon, I felt robbed since N64 games were super expensive, especially in Latin America.

My racer of choice on the N64 would have to be Ridge Racer 64. It was a beautiful game at the time and I would say it still holds up today.

I came back to this recently and found the controls almost unplayable. BUT, back in the day this was my favourite racing game on the system. After you mastered the controls, the graphics, music (on the PAL version anyway) and physics were top notch for the time period. I'd never played a racing game before which actually attempted to model suspension movement and how it affects car behaviour... until I played this. For an early N64 game the graphics were amazing - sure they were a tad smooth/blurry but they looked quite realistic compared to many other games available on the system at the time. Different weather conditions and times were also something I hadn't seen before. It's sort of something that's hard to come back to 15+ years later and review fairly... it hasn't aged well. But at the time it was something quite special. Even if none of my friends could control the cars, and the wall-riding issues 😅

I'm glad you uploaded this video. I was stumped last night trying to remember what racing game I used to play on the super nintendo when I was a kid. I kept watching videos of the game "Test Drive" because that's all I could think of but I knew it wasn't the game I was thinking of so I said fuck it and went to sleep then you jogged my memory with this video. Thanks!

loved this game back in the day, that last track was a nightmare :) don't know if i would like it now though

Turok I loved a child, tried again recently and it was so bad :(

I would say that just 5 tracks is pretty poor for a racing game (weather doesn't give variety and the mountain stage sucks). But the game is still great, the controls take sometime to get used to, but you start getting more interesed in the driving as you play more (if anyone is playing it, I recommend type 3 handling, auto, hard suspension and grippy tires). And the music is it's strongest point imo.

hey Glenn, have you reviewed Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2 yet? If not it would be cool if you did.

Problem is there are tons of quality racers for the system. Being able to decal the car was nice though.

you missed out some points about this game, 1 it's released for PC under the title Bossrally 2 PC edition has extra tracks and cars 3 looks better than N64 also plays better in some cases

I loved it back then. I wonder how i would feel now :D

Maybe you've heard of a game called red asphalt? Great advertisements before it came out, she was let down when finally played.

I liked this game when i first got it around 2004 but when i went back to replay it this summer i didn't. It really felt like i could only see 20 ft in front of my car so cornering felt like i was blind. Actually one of the snow tracks me and my cousin were playing we kept going off and it was so hard to see we literally could barely find the track again. I do love the way the driving feels though and this game would still be one of the better racers if it weren't for the draw distance and the fogging.

Looks like it would be fun. Too bad I never heard of it until today.

I would trade my Top Gear Overdrive for this game any day of the week.

Love this game as a kid, and best top gear games And how to applaud Midway, and Boss Game Studio’s top gear rally the best top gear series back then

Off Road Challenge stills the best racing game made by Midway in the N64 ever.

What a great game! Ive played this game for years, and i still love it to this day! It was my favorite racing game along with grand turismo back in the days.

I liked this game a lot as a kid. i thought the music was alright too

This game is awesome, I plan to buy all 4 Top Gear games on N64!

This looks like one of those games that plays properly in first person view only. The external car movements don't behave as expected, which threw me off just watching the footage.

Star Wars podracer was one that I loved as a kid and now it's like wow the handling and graphics are terrible

Thank you for this video, it was about halfway through the video when I realized that I had played this back in the day and I had a lot of fun with it, thank you, great memories. And to your point that games that you loved before and now feel terrible, I have a lot to say, but just so I dont bore you to death, lets just say that, you're right just because you loved some games before when you were a kid, doesn't make them great games today, some games survive pretty well the passing of time others not so much, for example I loved star wars shadows of the empire back then, today I can barely stand to watch it, let alone play it, it's sad but it's the truth, the greatness of these games will only survive in the memory of those that were privileged enough to live in those times, hopefully the new generations can find a place in their hearts for those games so their history is preserved, otherwise they'll be lost forever.

I actually got a VHS tape mailed to me advertising this game(among others). But I never played it to one day brother bought it a few years back. I hardly play it and may just get rid of it soon.

Not N64 exactly but I have had this same feeling with a lot of rally games. I love rally games and am still keeping track with them today but I recently went back to play a few older classics and ended up feeling let down. V-RALLY 2, WRC arcade and even my favourite - Colin McRae 3 - just weren't as good as I remember them. I hope there's a new rally game soon that can keep me hooked throughout a whole championship. Looking forward to WRC 5.

I purchased this game on release and really enjoyed it while it lasted. Imo top gear rally had some of the best handling and physics from its era. Its suspension feel over bumps was its strong point although the barrier collision was frustrating and flawed. For the most part I liked the visuals and smooth framerate. The sound and music were just dull and lifeless

Lego Racers is the game I enjoyed playing so much as a kid. After years of not playing it (nearly a decade) I decided to play it...yeah, its not as good as I remembered.

Yeah, I also liked that as a kid, and going back I thought "how the fuck did I play this? I cant controll this car, its like on oily ice" Im sure Ive beaten much harder racing games, and I unlocked almost everything back then in the 90s, but I gave up on this one frustrated. A game which left me a bit disappointed going back, for me, was Operation Winback. Just didnt age so great.

I still have my copy of the game and my only real memory of it was giving up racing and me and a friend just exploring the tracks. I guess I probably found it difficult to control so just gave up.

I find that the biggest problem with this game is the color palette of these cars. They're so much brighter than anything in the surroundings, they stick out against the background like the toons in Who Framed Roger Rabbit.

The main reason I played this game was for the Paint Shop! I had this game because my brother loved racing games, but apart from the Paint Shop, this game never appealed to me, and racing games of this type never really have. For me, racing games need a touch of whackiness to them, like Mario Kart 64. Otherwise if you've played one, you've played them all. Although I disagree with you about the music. I did enjoy the soundtrack for this game.

Best racing game of that decade as far as I'm concerned!

'GoldenEye'. Yes, I'm going there. I really loved 'GoldenEye' in 1998 and 1999, having spent hundreds of hours in both the campaign and multiplayer modes. Unfortunately, thanks to Rare's 'Perfect Dark' -- a superior game in every conceivable way -- I just don't have any desire to don James Bond's virtual tuxedo anymore.

i like the "floaty" controls.

Not that it was a BIG disappointment, but going back to Pilotwings 64 didn't feel nearly the same after a 15+ year break. It was one of the first N64 games I had ever tried, and at the time, it felt very free-roam at times, and I could just mess with it for hours, doing basically nothing. I'd still say it's a solid 7/10, but I guess the idea and scope of "exploration" in games has just come so much further.

Handling type 1, tires slippy, suspension normal, and manual gears control type A. This was probably my first introduction to manual gear and throttle control in a racing game, and probably why I consider it one of the best racers on the console. And I'm not sure what you meant by no other racers in the course, In championship mode there are 20 racers to pass in 3 laps.

Top Gear Rally was an attractive game on release for a number of reasons - it was the first to feature large draw distances with little pop up, smooth textures, solid landscapes, AA, vehicle deformation and lighting- albeit BOSS should have tightened the controls a lot more. The 5mb cart certainly hampered what they could do - this is probably why the game looks so barren in areas, and quite detailed in others - memory restrictions abound. If only Nintendo put some money behind Boss and gave them more room to play it could have been so much more like their original demo - I think the main issue for them was lack of time in the end and Nintendo's shit dev kits. World Driver is like a different game graphically but it was running on Boss's own Microcode - so it speaks volumes for how needlessly challenging Nintendo made it for small developers back then.

ah that music. Challenging controls that you never quite manage to master do take away from this game but it does have it's moments when you wrestle control. Again that music

The music! 😍😍😍

Riding the walls is key on this game, you go so much faster than driving notmally

Yo Glenn, will you ever be reviewing the sequel? You've covered all the other Top Gear games so far. :)

THANK YOU! my uncle and older brother used to play this and i would just be there hugging the wall... cause the turning sucked too much!

it wasn't on the N64 but the game Stunt Race FX on SNES was very disappointing when I purchased and played it again a few years ago. I don't remember the frames being so low at the time.

I quite enjoyed this game, but it was definitely frustrating at times. But once you dialed in the perfect combination, this made for a more interesting and fun game, although it's certainly not the best out there. My personal favorite (even though I was usually pretty bad at it) was Rush 2049. The fact that you could change certain things with your vehicle, and the addition of the stunt course in multiplayer made that one in particular quite an amazing game. If you did a review on that, I'd probably lose my poo. :)

I remember playing this use hug the wall same on forza horizon 4 i do it i have a ford escort replica

At first, I hated the game, then I learned how to play and kick the cars outside the road and I loved it.

Bomberman Hero was one that I played back in 1998 and loved, then played it a few months ago and actually found it to be annoying as hell. The soundtrack is still great though.

I enjoyed this game as a kid, haven't played it in forever though. May need to go dust it off... Also, I remember going to Best buy to buy Diddy Kong racing, but when I saw this game on demo, I bought this game instead. The "floatiness" was definitely tough to master. But I always attributed speed to becoming more uncontrollable so as a kid it made sense to me.

I enjoyed this game

That was a really nice game ... memories for life mate ... It was just for who is pro ... I mean tried a lot how it works ... I was able to finish but took days.

There's actually a sequel for this, it's called Top Gear: Rally 2, if you've done a review of this, could you reply with the link?

So much good memories 😊

Yooo! I remember this game. Never owned the game, it was just one of those titles that showed up from time to time. Played it at friends. I was like 11 when I played it first, but I still enjoyed it, despite each time I got it I never had a memory card, along with a few of my games. But was still alright to play. Do quest 64! :D

Plaid this game to death back in the day.

You should review Top Gear Rally 2, it's a completely different game by a different studio.

I played this and Pole Position 64 when we got an N64 in Christmas 1997. I was less than impressed with both of them. What really disappointed me in this one was the graphics. Having played Sega arcade games with such bright vibrant colours, I was shocked at how dull everything looked here. Everything looked so washed out and blurry - a very dull look. The tracks lacked variation and the cars looked blocky and almost cartoonish.

I remember this game,it was ok but I had a pc at the same time and had championship rally on that,the svga graphics and gameplay plus the higher steady frame rates really showed this game up horribly! On the other hand I kept my n64 as I loved wave race so much.