Off Road Challenge Playthrough (Actual N64 Capture) - Rookie Circuit

[Note: This video and description were originally posted on Youtube on January 28, 2016.]

This is part 1 of my capture of me playing through Off Road Challenge for the Nintendo 64. This is not an emulator. This footage was recorded directly from my Nintendo 64 using an actual Off Road Challenge cartridge. I'm playing on normal difficulty using a manual transmission.

A couple years ago I picked up a brand new steering wheel for my Nintendo 64 (Interact's V3 Racing Wheel). I had seen the wheel in stores back in the day, but I never got to use one until 2013. Since I had picked up Off Road Challenge around the same time, I put the wheel to good use by playing through the entire game with it. It was a lot of fun, and I later completed Hydro Thunder as well using the wheel.

I've played several Off Road Challenge arcade machines ever since they were released in the late '90s. In fact, there are still a few machines around my area. I recall renting the N64 version some time after it came out, but I never bothered to pick up my own copy. I was probably satisfied with Top Gear Rally and World Driver Championship (not to mention Wave Race 64 and Mario Kart 64), which were deeper racing games.

Interestingly, I had a neighbor in the late '90s who hadn't owned a video game console since the NES era (he was probably around 40 years old). He told me he liked the Off Road Challenge arcade machine, and I mentioned that the game was available on the Nintendo 64. Well, soon after, he actually went out and bought a Nintendo 64 just to play that game. However, one thing that bothered him was that his controller didn't shake whereas the steering wheel on the arcade machine shook whenever you crashed into stuff. So I let him borrow my Rumble Pak to get more of an arcade experience and he thought that was cool.

Off Road Challenge itself is good, mindless fun, and it's cheap enough to acquire. Playing this game with the V3 is a ton of fun and really gives you an arcade experience at home. The steering wheel itself works really well and is even completely customizable. I was able to reassign buttons and manually adjust the sensitivity of the steering too (you're not stuck with preset sensitivities).

The Nintendo 64 port of this game is fairly similar to the arcade version, but I've noticed a couple of differences. First, the arcade game seems to run at 60 fps, whereas this version does not. Second, the arcade version allows you run over animals (such as cattle) and spray them all over the road, which is hilarious. The Nintendo 64 version is sadly missing that feature. Aside from those issues though, this is a pretty good console port.

In this video I completed the first circuit, the Rookie Circuit, using the Toyota Trophy Truck. I love Toyota Trucks (I own one), and I especially like Ivan Stewart's old trophy truck, so I had to use that one.

Not all of these races were completed back-to-back in a single session. Although some races were completed back-to-back, I mostly edited together the successful races for a single video.

Recorded with the Hauppauge HD PVR and the official N64 S-video cable. I used a Toshiba model D-R550 DVD Recorder to upconvert the N64's native 240p signal to 480i so that the Hauppauge could capture the console's audio/video signal.

I'm using an Interact V3 Racing Wheel.