Daytona USA was one of the early hits on the Sega Saturn. This 3D racer debuted in the arcades to huge fanfare. It was widely popular in the coin-ops but at home it didn’t hit the same notes. That’s because other racers were pushing the boundaries of the genre further with better graphics and more complicated physics. Daytona USA seemed behind the times when it launched on Sega’s console. It also didn’t help that it was really lacking in content. Considering the compact disc format promised bigger games the fact that this one had only three tracks and two cars was almost inexcusable. I liked Daytona USA from the first time I played it, but I wanted more. Sega answered fans cries when they released an expanded version with significantly more content. Daytona USA: Championship Circuit Edition is amazing. Let’s take a look.
The base game is the same. All of the content from the first Daytona USA is intact here (barring a few of the options, of course). You now have two new stages (almost double the original) as well as eight cars to choose from. When compared to the original release this is pretty much twice the game. It’s what Daytona USA on the Saturn should have been in the first place. Some other changes were made as well. The biggest is that Sega took the graphics engine from their other game Sega Rally and used it as the base here. Because of this the graphics are greatly improved, there’s far less pop-in, and the framerate is much better. I’ll cover this more later on.
Daytona USA: Championship Circuit Edition is a 3D stock car racing game. Each race consists of multiple laps around an unchanging course. You’ll face anywhere from one other opponent up to 40 total racers at once. Gameplay is based around the time limit. Consider it your primary enemy here. This begins ticking down the moment a match begins, and can only be restored by passing through the various checkpoints in each track. When time runs out the race is over. I was disappointed to see that you can’t simply coast over a checkpoint. Instead your car comes to a screeching halt. The time limit is very strict. It feels like you can never really ‘gain’ time and instead must maintain it.
Because of this it you can’t really make more than a few mistakes in any single race or you risk time running out. Slamming into cars and walls is extremely detrimental. This brings me to the physics engine. It feels really good. The handling really gives you a sense for the tires gripping the road. What’s neat is that when you choose a car that has bad traction the tires skid out for a while every time the gas is throttled. You have to tap the gas to start slower to let friction do its job. Turning is more difficult than in your standard racing game. Everything feels more stiff. I have never driven a stock car so I can’t comment to the accuracy of this. It does however make Daytona USA feel different compared to other racers. There’s an unusual ‘snap’ when your tires straighten out after a turn.
When hitting barriers your car bounces off of them in fairly realistic fashion. As you smack into things (cars and the environment) the vehicle takes visible damage. This can be things like the front hood crunching in or coming loose along with various dents to back as well. Full blown wrecks however are really wonky. Your car bounces around flipping every which way before always landing upright. It looks like something straight out of a cartoon. Considering Sega went the realistic route with this one it’s surprising that they overlooked something so obvious. This took me straight out of the action whenever it occurred. Even having the car land upside down and spawn in would have been a much better choice.
The courses offer a lot of diversity. In the original iteration the three were just called beginner, advanced and expert. Here they have actual names. Three Seven Speedway is the track most people associate with the Daytona USA franchise. It’s also the only one where you get a rolling start meaning you take control while the cars are already in motion. Then there’s Dinosaur Canyon (which is sadly lacking in dinosaurs) as well as the excellent Seaside Street Galaxy. The two new courses are actually some of my favorite ones in the entire series. National Park Speedway has really well done turns and a somewhat confusing layout. I say that in the best way possible. Desert City is interesting because it’s one of only a few courses that has a tunnel in it.
My one complaint about the courses is that I sometimes had a difficult time telling where to go. There are these weird dead ends in some of the tracks (the new courses in particular) and they are marked with cones sometimes, but others not. Generally you’ll see signs pointing the direction of the turn. Unfortunately I didn’t always notice them. One crash, if it’s bad enough, can put you behind on the time so far that you’ll never recover. There is a mini-map on-screen to help alleviate this issue, but I felt like I never had time to glance at it. The races are really fast paced and there are breakneck turns constantly. I found the only way to solve this problem was by memorizing the layouts. Each lap is pretty short so this isn’t a major issue, but newcomers might find the learning curve too high.
There are also quite a few different options here. On top of all the aforementioned tracks, as well as the new cars you can fine tune the experience. This includes difficulty settings, transmission type (it’s now no longer car specific) and more. As I mentioned earlier there’s also a two player split screen mode. This alone is a huge upgrade from the original. The graphics and framerate take some serious hits when going split screen but they’re still at least as good as the first one was in single player. Multiplayer isn’t super impressive technically but it’s definitely serviceable. It’s inclusion in the home versions was sorely missed, and I’m beyond glad they finally included it here.
I liked Daytona USA. Championship Circuit Edition is a lot more of what made the original so special. With that said I find I have to be in a particular mood to get the most out of this one. It isn’t as much of a pick up and play racer for me as others like Ridge Racer are. The springy physics in turns (again, I’m assuming it’s because these are box cars we’re talking about) is a bit unwieldly at times. Even if you’re good at racing games it can take a while to get a good handle on how turning works. The same goes for braking. It’s far easier than you’d expect to skid off a track. I haven’t experienced physics quite like these before. Despite this I still think Daytona USA: Championship Circuit is one of the best Sega Saturn games of all time.
The differences in graphics between Daytona USA and the Championship Circuit Edition are like night and day. Car models have significantly more detail with many more polygons used to render each one. The textures are also much higher resolution. This version of the game doesn’t suffer from the same chunky pixel work that the original did, and that’s just fine by me. Even the pop-in issues have been worked on. It’s still present, but much more infrequently. The framerate is the most significant upgrade here. Daytona USA: Championship Circuit Edition runs at a steady thirty frames per second and looks amazing because of it. The soundtrack on the other hand I’m less of a fan of. Sega changed the music around, and now the iconic tracks from the original release have either been remixed or were cut. The soundtrack is still okay, but it’s not nearly as good.
