Lego Racers (PlayStation) Walkthrough

Well, here we are with the PS1 version of Lego Racers. I ran across this in a used game store the other day and saw there weren't really a whole lot of decent gameplay videos on it, and fewer that were full walkthroughs (the only one that I saw filtered the graphics, giving everything but an authentic experience), so I went on ahead and picked it up.

Oh my word I wish I knew what I was getting myself into. To put it in very simple terms...

THIS VERSION IS FREAKING HORRIBLE.

Good GOSH where do I start on this? The graphics are watered way down, the frame rate is super choppy and lag crops up all over the place, there are load times everywhere, and worst of all...there's a DELAY in the control. Yes, you heard me right -- the controls are unresponsive IN A RACING GAME THAT REQUIRES FAST REFLEXES. The whole game is almost completely unplayable because of this. If you think I'm playing badly in this video here, I promise you it's not all my fault -- the steering is delayed by about a quarter of a second, which makes tight turns an absolute nightmare and almost makes drifting an unneccessary risk. Oh yeah, I'll also add that playing this in an emulator does NOT give an experience similar to a console -- it actually plays the game at a reasonable speed, negating all the issues this version has. So don't go telling me you were able to play it just fine.

I did the best I could, but the crippling controls made anything simple an exercise in frustration. Frankly I'm not surprised almost nobody remembers this version fondly. It feels like they just hastily ported all the PC code quickly over and didn't bother checking if it would actually play okay on the PS1.

Eh, enough ranting I suppose...

Build Mode -- I was just going to show the mode for a bit but I ended up getting carried away and building an entire car. Oops.

Also, something I feel I should note -- in my PC walkthrough, I usually just used the car each boss uses in the game; here, I opted for the other "quick build" option just for a bit of uniqueness. So, before you go telling me I picked the "wrong car", it was intentional.

Circuit 1 -- This went okay, ended up getting first on all the courses which was nice. Also, can someone tell me why they switched around Dark Forest Dash and Royal Knights Raceway's music for this version?

Circuit 2 -- Royal Knights Raceway went REALLY bad here. I ended up screwing up enough that I ended in dead last. Good grief. I tried fixing it by frantically going after all the warp turbos I could, but it was too little too late.

Circuit 3 -- I think I nearly snapped my controller in half on a few attempts at this circuit. It was that bad. Making ANY mistakes on these tracks is costly, which of course is easy to do because of how awful the control is. And worse yet, Pirate Skull Pass is borderline unplayable because of insane lag.

Circuit 4 & 5 -- Straightforward.

Circuit 6 -- Actually went surprisingly well.

Circuit 7 -- This one took several restarts. It almost entirely boils down to the fact that if Rocket gets a turbo start, you lose by default. You basically just have to keep restarting until he fails the turbo start.


Time Races -- I almost wish I chose not to do these. The controls really bring out the worst of these time trials. Ugh.

On Imperial Grand Prix, I accidentally said "Yes" to "race again" after finishing, and if you exit after doing this, even if you won the time trial, it doesn't count it. I edited out a redo of this track where I didn't make this mistake and cleanly transitioned to the "won car set" cutscene so you won't notice anything.

On Magma Moon Marathon, I mistakenly forgot to edit out a failed attempt. Oops.

Royal Knights Raceway was DANGEROUSLY close. If I hadn't gotten that warp turbo at the very end I would not have won the time trial. That was extremely nerve wracking.

Why exactly did I hear Adventure Temple Trail's theme on Amazon Adventure Alley? Also, Veronica is much easier here than she was in the PC version, as she never uses the warp turbo here.

Speaking of which, she also takes a different path on Pirate Skull Pass here, opting for the first warp turbo instead of the second. Huh.

Adventure Temple Trail was a NIGHTMARE. To put it simply, there is no faster path than the one Veronica takes. You absolutely have to take the path she takes, and you must do it PERFECTLY. I cannot tell you how many runs were killed because of that forsaken set of two white bricks by the idol. There were so many times I didn't drift at just the right angle and missed one of them. If you miss those, there's no opportunity to make it up. I edited out a dozen attempts at this one and I cannot tell you how relieved I was to finally finish this one when I did. The run you see here was marginal at best too. Gosh I hope I never have to attempt this course ever again.

And that's just about it. Enjoy the walkthrough...trust me when I say this version is more fun to watch than it is to play.