Once you get past the wonderful control and exciting track design, the feel of this game will stun you. It's just so famn dast! Your surroundings rocket by you at blistering speeds and you feel amazed at how you can maintain control. Game play in Star Wars: Episode I Racer is exciting, fun, involving, easy, rich, and varied. Can one say any more?

The graphics of Episode I Racer are quite good, but not as good as they could have been. 16-bit color drawn through Direct 3D is great, but it's been done. Rollcage has better-looking levels, though with not as much variety. Expendable has a lot more detail too. LucasArts did a great job with the modeling and skins of the various ships. You'll grow attached to your favorite design. There are a few flaws which LucasArts should have caught. Often times there are 2D objects where they should have used a 3D polygonal object. For instance, when you pass by cheering crowds, you just get a bleacher shaped polygon with a mottled texture. The skies of the various planets are pretty darn bland. We also experienced some bad collision detection where parts of your racer would intersect with the ground instead of bouncing off of it. But the cut scenes are really a joy. Ray traced animations in the Star Wars universe always get a game on our good side. Overall, the graphics are quite good but not perfect. Luc asArts did a good job, but didn't spend as much time as they could have.

Sound in Episode I Racer is just wonderful. They make full use of 3D sound and it adds a lot to the experience. You'll be reminded a lot of the movie. A really nice touch was the addition of voices for every creature. If you bump into someone, you'll hear a jeer or taunt, and you can also launch one yourself with a quick button press. Of course, there is only a single human racer in the bunch, so the vast majority of insults are angry gibberish in non-existent Star Wars languages. Ok ok, they existed long long ago, in a galaxy far far away. We stand corrected. Actually, they tend to sound an awful lot like Mush Mouth of the Cosby Kids.