Andretti Racing review (PC)

But don't be fooled into thinking that because Andretti Racing's a little lenient on the handling side that it's also a pushover in the competition department. There are four or five guys on each circuit who are definite losers, but the top dogs - all the real-life Indy Car drivers, for instance - are considerably tougher to defeat, especially when you consider the brevity of each race. Thankfully, you never get the impression that they're totally unbeatable; you only feel that with enough practice you'll find a way to hang with and eventually beat them.

Considering the bang-up job Electronic Arts has done with the graphics in games like Moto Racer and Need for Speed II, I was expecting just a tad more from Andretti Racing in the looks department. The cars, tracks, and immediate trackside objects are impressive enough if you've got a supported 3D video card, but even with hardware support you'll spot plenty of 2D objects in the background scenery (any trees you spot will look especially crummy). That's almost nit-picking, though, since most gamers will be focused on the track and not the Toronto skyline. And Andretti blows CART Precision Racing away in the frames-per-second department when all the graphics goodies are activated (at least on my system), though it still can't match the performance of the Rendition-ready version of IndyCar II that came with my Total Canopus 3D.

A couple of minor features are strangely absent from Andretti Racing: There's no way to see a race-ending crash in instant replay (the race ends immediately), you can't view replays from the cockpit of a competitor's car, and there aren't any options for setting weather conditions or even the strength of your opponents.

Andretti features all the usual multiplayer modes - modem, serial, and IPX network play are supported - but I was a little perturbed that Internet play wasn't supported with the shipping version. After getting crushed repeatedly in CART Precision Racing on the Internet Gaming Zone, Andretti Racing had me psyched for some Net racing with an arcade flair - but instead all I got was an option to play on Mplayer that hasn't yet been activated.

It would be easy to slag Andretti Racing because it doesn't boast the features of racing sims like NASCAR 2 and CART Precision Racing, but that would be comparing apples and oranges. This is a game, not a sim, and as long as you're OK with that concept then you should get a real kick out of Andretti Racing.