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Game info |
|  | Super Hang-On |  | Genre | Racing | Developer / Publisher | Software Studios | Released | 1988 | Media | 1 x  | Rating
 | Graphics: | 6.5 | Sound: | 6.0 | Gameplay: | 8.5 | Overall: | 7.0 |
| Reviewed by | ndial | Super Hang-On was a tried and true formula like any other great arcade bike (and car) racer where you race from checkpoint to checkpoint racing against the clock while doing your best not to crash into the other hordes (!) of other racers, and of course, trying to keep both wheels off the dirt! The game was originally released on the arcades by SEGA in 1986, and ported in 1988 to the 16bit Commodore Amiga, Atari ST by Electronic Dreams and PC (MS-DOS) by Data East. The game was also ported to the 8bit Amstrad CPC, ZX Spectrum, and Commodore 64 home computers as well as (of course) on the SEGA Megadrive/Genesis and Sharp X68000 consoles. |
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Review |
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 The PC (MS-DOS) version was released by Data East in 1988. You race a motorbike through four continents - Africa, Asia, America and Europe. Each is divided into timed stages and failing to complete a stage in the required time, the game is over. Each stage gives you 32 seconds to complete, and any time left from the previous stage, is added to the newly 32 seconds. The standard acceleration control can be held down for most of the race, but for really tricky bends you will have to resort to the brake. The change in speed affects the radius of your turn, which may easily drop you onto road signs or road lights... What is really exciting on this game is that when you gain enough speed your speedo will turn red signifying you can activate your boost which is not limited at all! As long as you hold it down you will keep boosting which gives a real rush as your engine screams out higher and higher pitched the longer you boost! Ok, the computer and consoles versions are not the same as on the arcade game, mainly because there were different versions in the arcades. Those differences though rely only on the position and the type of the (original) bends. Super Hang-On was a tried and true formula like any other great arcade bike (and car) racer released. Especially the original (arcades) version in which the player played it on a full-scaled motorbike model was an enormous experience back to the days! The game runs fast and smooth. In fact, it runs too fast when played on an Intel 286 or equivalent back to the days. Technically the game cannot compare by any means to the Amiga and Atari ST ports though. Most of the original graphics detail is missing here, which is rather normal for a 1988 DOS game that runs only on EGA or CGA graphics mode. Motorbikes are nicely designed having some impressive animation touches taken from the original (i.e. when crashing, the bike rolls over the air etc). Graphics are overall ok and change in appearance, colors and background as you progress through each chekpoint which gives seamless nonstop progression through the game. Other objects such as road signs, lights, trees etc are also nicely drawn and keep (along with the static backdrops) presentation in good standards. Soundwise, the PC (MS-DOS) version supports AdLib sound hardware offering non-sampled in-game SFX (engine roaring, tires gripping, and the turbo boost sound). Music is missing though during gameplay and found only on the Amiga and ST versions. | |
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Screenshots |
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Gameplay sample |
| | Some videos belong to retroshowcase.com (indicated); others not | |
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Comparable platforms |
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|  | Arcades (original version) |
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Hardware information |
| PC (ms-dos based) CPU: Various processors from Intel,AMD, Cyrix, varying from 4.77Mhz (Intel 8088) to 200Mhz (Pentium MMX) and up to 1995 (available on this site) MEMORY: 640Kb to 32MB RAM (typical up to 1996) GRAPHICS: VGA standard palette has 256 colors and supports: 640x480 (16 colors or monochrome), 640x350 in 16 colors (EGA compatability mode), 320x200 (16 or 256 colors). Later models (SVGA) featured 18bit color palette (262,144-color) or 24bit (16Milion colors), various graphics chips supporting hardware acceleration mainly for 3D-based graphics routines. SOUND: 8 to 16 bit sound cards: Ad-Lib featuring Yamaha YMF262 supporting FM synthesis and (OPL3) and 12-bit digital PCM stereo, Sound Blaster and compatibles supporting Dynamic Wavetable Synthesis, 16-bit CD-quality digital audio sampling, internal memory up to 4MB audio channels varying from 8 to 64! etc. Other notable sound hardware is the release of Gravis Ultrasound with outstanding features!
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 | CGA: 16-color palette (4 on-screen) |  | EGA: 64-color palette (16 on-screen) |  | VGA: 256-color palette (256 on-screen) | |
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