SEGA Touring Car Championship

Sega Touring Car Championship released for the Sega Saturn in 1997. A conversion of the Arcade original.

The game has two modes of play, Arcade and Saturn. The main difference between the two modes is that the Saturn mode allows some customisation of the game and cars. The game is quite difficult as the a.i drivers don't let up and will always be on your tail just waiting for you to make a mistake. The game is made more difficult by an erratic and twitchy controls and having little to no grip all in the name of realism. Realism that the a.i drivers don't have to worry about as they take corners at max speed without sliding out...

Initially I recorded parts of Saturn side first and then proceeded to Arcade mode. I have edited the video in a way that makes more sense, but you may see some things that look odd as they are now out of order like when setting up the game controls.

To complete the championship you need to get a good time in the first 3 rounds. It helps to get a good qualifying time at the start so that you are not right at the back starting the main race. Getting overall 1st place (quickest championship time) unlocks the 4th race. you need to get at least 3rd place (onto the podium) in order to unlock the ending. 3 of the cars have alternate skins. I like the toyota for its speed and acceleration. It easy to spin out, but its speed makes up for it getting you back in the game. The Opel has the best handling and good speed but may cost you some time if you do manage to spin out. I did not get on well with the Amg or Alpharomeo. slow and slid outwards to much

A run though of what is in the video:-

00:00:00 Arcade Mode, Championship. A run through of championship mode. Completing it Unlocks Grand Prix mode.

00:11:00 Arcade Mode, Grand Prix Mode. You can race on any one of the four main tracks for 20 laps. You only need to race on one of them to Unlock Expert Mode.

00:21:25 Arcade Mode, Expert Mode. A run though of the expert Championship. The main change seems to be the traction. Either the car setup has changed or the tarmac has as it is like driving on ice with the car sliding everywhere. The A.I cars only seem more aggressive as I am going slower due to lack of traction in some parts. After completion and receiving 'Master of Arcade Mode' I show the race again in Replay mode

00:38:13 Saturn Mode, Championship. I complete a run through of the Championship mode unlocking the Exhibition Race. Incidentally I setup a custom car config, but decided to stick with default to show it can be done as is.

00:48:45 Saturn Mode, Exhibition race. A race on the unlocked Boomtown track. Coming in first unlocks the 'Sega Prototype Car'. a race replay follows.

00:53:13 Saturn Mode, Global Net Event 1 (Dec 25th 1997). I use a cheat to unlock these as I had the clock set wrong at the start of the game. This is the first of the games net Events. A drive around an icy track.

00:55:45 Saturn Mode, Global net Event 2 (Feb 13th 1998) The Second Net event. Hit all the cones!

00:59:26 Saturn Mode, Global net Event 3 (1st April 1998) The Third Net Event. Race backwards. Don't bump into oncoming cars and put in a good time.

01:01:44 Saturn Mode, Championship Mode, Expert Difficulty. Mainly to show off the Sega Prototype Car. This is not needed at all for game progression. The difficulty setting pretty much only effects the available race time which is stupidly tight on rounds 2 and 3. A Race replay follows.

01:18:00 Saturn Mode, VS Race. A race against the Sega A.I Car. What you don't see here is the many many many hours of Korean style grinding effort of training up the A.I car to become race worthy. You need to race all the tracks many many times for the a.i to become comfortable at going fast on all tracks. The car does not care about how you drive. the only factor in if the car A.I is race driver material is the number of laps raced against. It's soul destroying ...

01:20:10 Saturn Mode, Championship with Sega A.I Racer. With a competent A.I racer now available, I set game to Easy to give the driver half a chance and he just manages to scrape through to the final track. I did not spend much time on the Urban track and the a.i driver just manages to secure the needed podium finish. 'Master of saturn Mode' is now earned and the final two cars are unlocked.

01:30:22 A quick race on Boomtown to show the Toyota celica I manage to win but it was by no means easy. The car is not suited to this game.
01:32:44 Finally a race on Boomtown with the Lancia Delta. Again not suited to this game and I just can't compete as it slides out all the time.