You slide behind the wheel of a red convertible, a blonde beside you and the open road ahead toward the setting sun. Out Run on the SEGA Mega Drive brings one of the most influential racing arcade machines of the eighties to Sega's home console.
The original arcade machine was created by the team around the legendary designer Yu Suzuki at Sega in the mid-eighties. Out Run was not about beating rivals, but about the freedom of the drive. At forks in the road the player chooses their own way, so there are several different destinations and routes across picturesque scenery, from the coast to the mountains. This idea of choosing your path was refreshing for its time and set the game apart from other races.
The gameplay is about a race against time. You must drive through the individual sections before the limit at the checkpoints runs out, weave through dense traffic, and handle corners at high speed. Part of the unmistakable atmosphere is the option to choose your music, tuning the on-board radio to one of the catchy tracks that then accompanies you throughout the ride. Out Run thus sold above all a feeling, the joy of speed and summer on four wheels.
Out Run went down in history as a pivotal title that elevated arcade racing and inspired a whole subgenre of brisk, uncomplicated racers focused on the joy of the drive. The brand saw a number of sequels, and its music and aesthetic remain to this day among the most memorable of eighties gaming culture.
The Mega Drive conversion brings this sense of freedom to a console, albeit one limited by hardware compared to the specialized arcade machine. It is a title that is not about perfection, but about that inimitable feeling of the open road and summer.
Why play it: A carefree celebration of speed and freedom behind the wheel, where you choose your own path and your own music toward the setting sun.
Game 65 of 151 for SEGA Mega Drive
The same title elsewhere (9)
Sega's 1986 arcade original ran on special Super Scaler hardware that let the road scale smoothly into the distance, with three selectable tunes playing from the cabinet's speakers. Home computers could not fully recreate that illusion of speed: the Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC, and Atari ST versions all show noticeably choppier road scrolling and less track detail. The Amiga kept decent smoothness and nicer visuals despite the limitations, while the Master System surprised with fairly faithful graphics and music for an eight-bit console. For the real arcade feeling, the original remains unmatched.
