A silly little rant against my video game

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
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So I am the proud owner of a new PSP. The geeky, gadget-gaga girly in me wanted one, and so I finally gave in and got it for myself. It came with a free game, TOCA Race Driver 2, and I was pretty chuffed.

It’s a great game - nice graphics, realistic control, excellent sound. All just hunky dory. The problem is, it’s freakin’ hard. It took me four days just to beat the first stupid championship. And I swear to god, the game cheats. I’ll be a good half a kilometer ahead of the pack, zipping along quite nicely, when out of absolutely nowhere, some idiot is catching up to me and passing me on a hairpin turn at 130mph. The other cars don’t seem to suffer fatal damage - I’ve tested this by ramming cars head on when I know they’re doing 150+ mph, and me going pretty damn fast myself. I take a fatal hit, and as the screen informs me that I’m too badly damaged to continue, I watch my victim shake it off and continue on racing. WTF?

So I thought, let’s go see what cheats exist for the game. Turns out, I have to pay for the cheats. My gaming purchases have been mostly limited to the Sims franchise over the last few years, but I have never, ever had to PAY for a cheat before. Ever! And then, the cheats don’t work in career mode anyway, so I don’t see much point in paying 3 GBP (or somewhere around 36 Rand) just to get a speed boost in the simulator mode. Then I notice I can sign up for Code M, the Codemasters members thing, and that I may just get a free cheat or two after all. So I register, confirm, etc. and happily proceed to the members area, mentally rubbing my hands together in anticipation, only to find that TOCA Race Drivers 2 is one of the few games that don’t have any free cheats. Just a driving guide - mostly for tracks I haven’t been to yet because I can’t get past the second freaking championship!

It’s a good game, and I’ll keep playing it, but dammit it’s pissing me off.

And my thumbs hurt!

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Of course the computer cheast! It ALWAYS cheats. It’s rare to find a game that doesn’t cheat.

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TMINC - A little primer:

Re. the video game community - There’s something you gotta understand about these guys. They’re competitive. Insanely so. And the vast majority of them won’t even touch something that’s “too easy”. And given how unbelievably awesome some of them are (go look at any Internet Ranking or VG message board if you need proof), a game’s gotta be pretty tough to challenge them. This isn’t a problem for something like Dance Dance Revolution, which can have a variety of difficulties and still cater to the out-for-blood crowd, but racing games, unfortunately, can’t be so flexible.

Re. racing game junk - You’ve described the “rubber band effect” and everyone else’s vehicles being far more durable yours. Congratulations…you’ve discovered two things that have been driving racing gamers nuts for years. Incidentally, the main reason the computer is programmed to cheat is…er, that’s the only way to make the game challenging enough. I wish I were kidding.

Re. in-game cheats - You should never have to pay for in-game cheats, and certainly not for plain 'ol guides, both of which can be had for free on various websites (gamefaqs.com is one, although I’m not sure if TOCA Race Driver 2 has been covered yet).

However, if you’re serious about taking an edge, like me, in-game is definitely not the way to go. (A perfect example of this is the Grand Theft Auto games, which are full of incredibly ticky-tack codes which take off a few hundred points each. Sheesh, talk about overpriced help…) You want the real deal: a cheat device. Take AS MUCH as you want, WHEN you want it, and don’t have go give anything back. I have a Codebreaker for the PS2, and it’s been absolutely invaluable. I don’t think there’s anything for the PSP just yet, so you might want to keep your eyes open for something.

Above all else, don’t worry. It’s a game, not life. Not being able to clear the second championship is no biggie. When you start caring about not being able to clear the second championship, then you have a problem.

(P.S. - If at all possible, rent first. Buyback prices for used video games are really, really crummy.)

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First of all, congratulations on your PSP. It’s great fun with the right games (and not a bad unsecured-wireless-network detector). :wink:

If you want a good racing game, I’d recommend you try out (rent first!) Burnout Legends. The size of the PSP’s screen makes it a touch harder than its console kin, but it’s still a wickedly fun game, and if anything your car is more durable than the competition’s. :smiley:

Oh, and get used to the feeling of sore thumbs.