San Francisco Rush: Extreme Racing (Arcade)

San Francisco Rush: Extreme Racing

San Francisco Rush: Extreme Racing is the first game in the Rush series, released in 1996 in arcades by Atari Games. The original arcade release featured 8 cars, 3 tracks, and 6 music tracks. Unlike Atari's previous Hard Drivin' series, S.F. Rush emphasized high flying and improbable stunts and loosened the strict car physics realism of those games. An enhanced edition (marketed as a sequel) released in 1997, San Francisco Rush The Rock: Alcatraz Edition. In 1999, a true sequel was released, San Francisco Rush 2049.

Release

The game released in arcades in 1996, shipping as green top down arcade machines.

An enhanced edition (marketed as a sequel) released in 1997, San Francisco Rush The Rock: Alcatraz Edition, increased the amount of content to 12 cars, 7 tracks, and 7 songs. Other changes were made, such as music by default in game.

The game was ported to a few 5th generation consoles, including the Nintendo 64 and PlayStation. The former had six of the seven Rush The Rock tracks available, while the latter only had the original 3 tracks and a custom fourth track. For additional info on the home releases see San Francisco Rush: Extreme Racing (Console).

Gameplay

San Francisco Rush: Extreme Racing can be played Solo or against other drivers in head-to-head races. An emphasis on extreme mid air stunts and shortcuts reached by high jumps is a major part of the Rush gameplay.

Tracks

Players race on three tracks based on several districts of California's San Francisco city, organized by difficulty of the track.

Cars

There are eight selectable cars organized by four difficulties: Beginner, Advanced, Expert, and Extreme. The harder cars have inferior steering control but are faster. The Extreme car shows "WARNING FULL SIMULATION" when highlighted, is in a cage and when selected, the quote "It's Dangerous!" (voiced Spencer Lindsay) plays, which serves as warnings to new players that playing this car is hazardous due to its unforgiving control. Only four cars are shown at a time out of the eight, with button press being required to switch the available cars. However all selectable cars are a fixed color out of eight selected by the machine manager (linked cabinets are required to have different car colors).

San Francisco Rush The Rock: Alcatraz Edition

Released a year later in 1997, San Francisco Rush The Rock: Alcatraz Edition is a content upgrade (marketed as a sequel) to the original game. It was released as both an upgrade kit for existing machines and as a full dedicated cabinet. The new boot ROM, sound ROM, security PIC, four audio ROMs, and hard drive all need to be installed to upgrade the game software.

Differences between SFR and RTR

Gameplay

• Four new tracks, four new cars, and a new song are included.
• Extra shortcuts have been added to the original three tracks.
• To select alternative sets of cars, pressing View 1 now cycles through each set of cars instead of needing to be held down to alternate between the original two sets.
• Game difficulty and number of laps per track is now adjustable in the test menu.
• The tracks now have names (Golden Gate, Embarcadero, Market) instead of just being named their difficulty level.

Visual

• The track selection previews are from a different angle, with some different noted landmarks on each track and the track outline having different geometry.
• The purple RUSH logo that spins towards the screen now spells out ROCK and has a blueish hue to it. Instead of being interrupted by when loading is done, the logo now always reaches behind the camera.

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• The track selection screen has been rearranged to accompany the extra tracks.

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• The force feedback options are now categorized as Light/Medium/Heavy, instead of Regular/More/Full.

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• The transmission shifters on the selection screen have been redrawn. The in-game icons retain the original look.

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  SFR Automatic
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  RTR Automatic
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  SFR Manual
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  RTR Manual

• View 2 (hood view) is now centered on the hood instead of being on the driver's side. It is also slightly closer to the windshield.
• The mini-map no longer has a white outline and now shows the number of laps for every course. Originally, only Tracks 2 and 3 would show the laps remaining while Track 1 would only show the checkered flag.

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  SFR hood view
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  RTR hood view

• Moving to View 3 is now always instantaneous, where before in SFR there was a visible movement of the camera moving to behind the car when at speeds ≤ 50 MPH.

Audio

• Races start with the track's default song selected, instead of defaulting to song #0 (silence).
• The track selection song is a remixed version of the one in SFR.
• The race countdown fanfare is different.
• The announcer lines for choosing a track is different.
• The explosion sound no longer shares the same channel as the percussion in the music, meaning that the drums in songs don't cut out anymore if the player explodes.

Other

• The seat portion of the cabinet is now detachable, making it easier to transport.