Super Off-Road review - Sega Megadrive

Jump into your 4x4 off-road truck and burn around hazardous dirt tracks along with the greatest off-road racers in the world - including the legendary Ivan "Ironman" Stewart himself!

Super Off-Road is best described as a Super Sprint variant with more tracks, more obstacles and the ability to power-up your truck with better engines, tyres, and shock absorbers. The object of each race is to complete four laps of the off-road circuit before your opponents. Super Off-Road enables one or two players to face up to two or three computer-controlled trucks (one of which is driven by the awesome "Ironman"!). Beat your opponents and the prize money you gain is taken to the "Ironman" speed shop where you customise your truck's abilities by allocating your funds appropriately.

After that, it's back to the off-road circuit, where you indulge in more of the same driving-related tomfoolery.

What the Mean Machines staff thought

Ballistic should be applauded for releasing a game of this calibre as part of their £29.99 price range. Super Off-Road is an excellent conversion that's all the better when there are two players participating. The graphics are spot-on replicas of the arcade original, with extra tracks not included in the original coin-op (actually, I've a feeling that they're in the Off-Road Challenge follow-up). The sound effects and music are very dull though and they don't make any use of the Megadrive's sample-playing abilities. However, I can see single players getting a bit bored with this after a while as there isn't much in the way of variety, but if you've got a pal who fancies some two-player racing, get this!

Containing all the features of the arcade game and adding some extra features of its own, this conversion provides loads of two-player thrills and spills. The graphics are excellent, with the tiny cars bombing around nicely drawn tracks, but sadly the sound isn't so hot, with rather weak tunes and effects. What's most important is the playability, and Super Off-Road is very strong in this department, especially in two-player mode where the competitive edge of the proceedings really comes into its own. In one-player mode the game is still fun, but I found after a while it became a bit repetitive - beating the computer opponents is fun, but nothing like playing against another human. If you're after racing fun, this is well worth taking a look at, especially if you've often got a second player at hand to join in the action.