Motocross Madness

Motocross Madness took dirt bikes and turned them into a game where flying matters just as much as racing. It offers several modes: classic races on closed motocross tracks, long rides across open country, stadium racing, and above all a freestyle arena where you score points for tricks in the air. It was this combination of speed and acrobatics that made it a title players kept coming back to long after finishing the career mode.

The controls are built around shifting the rider's weight. Leaning forward and back handles landings, coming out of banked turns, and whether you stay in the saddle after a jump or end up in the dirt. The crash physics are exaggerated, and exactly that makes them fun — the rider tumbles down the slope like a ragdoll, and often the crash is funnier than a well-ridden race. The terrain is sprawling, made of hills, ravines, and jumps, which tempts you to leave the track and find your own paths. Technically the game used 3D acceleration and looked very clean for its time, with long draw distance and smooth performance. Internet multiplayer was among the best things racing games offered at the time.

The game was received very favorably at launch, praised above all for its great sense of riding, the humor of its crashes, and the freedom of movement across the terrain. Criticism pointed to the smaller amount of content and the fact that difficulty doesn't grow much once you've mastered the basics. Its influence on the genre was still considerable — the trick system and open terrain became the standard for later motocross and quad-bike games from the same studio. Today Motocross Madness is quick, no-strings-attached joy: hop on, ride up a hill, pull off a backflip, and laugh at the result. Few racing games of the era managed to be so carefree. It's also a nice example of how game spaces opened up in the late nineties: instead of a narrow track, the player got open country to ride in any direction, and the game didn't scold them for it but rewarded them with a new view.