When I found out that Gran Turismo isn't the only simulator out there, I wondered just what else could have been competing with the driving juggernaut. Nothing in my childhood came close to Gran Turismo, and my mind is drawing a blank at even naming more modern challengers. The Forza series, I suppose. Project Cars? But those are decades away. What was out in the late 1990s that did racing simulation as detailed as Gran Turismo?
As it turns out, it's a title I'd never know because I was a ten-year-old console peasant at the time. As in I was 10, not my console library. It wasn't even a library, I only had the PlayStation and the Game Boy and I'm off topic here.
For PC gamers, especially for fans of the motor-racing of the late 1960s, there was a simulator not to be missed, and it was simply titled Grand Prix Legends.
Dropping you into the 1967 Formula One season, you get to duke it out around Monaco, Silverstone and the Nürburgring against Jim Clark, Jack Brabham, Graham Hill and even more drivers you've never heard of unless you've an interest in the history of F1. The cars are engines with wheels, the safety standards are worryingly low and the noise of the engines is deafening. This is going to be fun.
Fun Times
The Wikipedia page for Grand Prix Legends is as empty as the pitlane in midrace, and so I headed over to YouTube to get my first taste of the game. It wasn't long before I was pausing the video and hunting down a copy for myself, because - partly from necessity but mostly for the joy of user-made visual overhauls and updates and the like - I was determined to play this for myself.
It looked so good - old, but good - that to just look at it wasn't enough for me to write about. I needed to play Grand Prix Legends, and after spending literally £0.09 on getting a second-hand copy, I was ready to jump in and install and patch all those many, many, many additions to the game.
I'm not sure what the difference between the original graphics and these updates are, though I hear the originals weren't anything special to look at. Usually, I'd insist on dialling back the options to get as true to the original as possible, but in this case, I don't actually know what the original game is like, and I really want to play the fancy version, with all the bells and whistles. All of them.
The only thing left to do was to actually play it.
There are a few modes to get stuck into, but a single race is the obvious starting point, and there's perhaps no more obvious event than the Monaco Grand Prix. After choosing a difficulty and adjusting the number of other drivers, you're good to go.
The menus aren't the easiest to navigate - the red and green corners are buttons to agree/proceed or disagree/go back, for example - but I got the idea that this single race was split into a practice session, qualifying, the main race and so on.
You can advance time to your heart's content, but you absolutely want to get out onto the track and just race, so into the practice session I went, and away we go.
This is Grand Prix Legends with updated graphics on an ultrawide monitor with, thankfully, low volume, because these cars scream. The engines are inches from our heads as we drive, and are exposed to the elements, presumably because they're going to inevitably catch fire, so you might as well have easy access to them.
I've mapped a couple of the controls to an Xbox controller. The D-pad is, unfortunately, the only set of buttons that work for steering, but as long as I've got left, right, accelerate and brake, I'm sure I can cope.
Tentatively, you accelerate the beast behind your head down the track, and already I'm marvelling at how Monaco-like this rendition of Monaco is. It sounds silly, but I really feel like I'm there. The track goes up where I expect it to go up, turns where I expect it to turn - I guess Gran Turismo and a passing interest in Formula 1 are to thank there...
But it wasn't long before things went a bit squiffy.
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| Oop, kerb. |
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| Ooop, barrier |
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| Ah, this looks lovely! |
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| I'm in Monaco! |
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| The back end has gone, hasn't it? |
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| Yeah, the back end has gone. |
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| It's still going. Hello, wall. |
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| Hello, tunnel. |
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| That haybale better be made of strong stuff. |
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| I've hit the wall, but the detail on it is wonderful. |
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| I'm going too quick. |
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| Very much too quick. |
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| Hello, barrier. |
Frustrations
This game is serious about its simulation. If you don't respect every aspect of these old cars, then you are going to be racing sideways - or worse. Crashes, or more often spins, are so frequent in the early days of Grand Prix Legends that you'll wonder just what it is about your game that is off.
Are the controls not quite set up right? Is the car not set up right? Am I not set up right? Everything will come together to ensure that the learning curve is present and mountainous. The novice difficulty is there so that you don't retire the second after you hit a barrier, and that's about it - everything else is deadly serious. Drive straight, brake early, go steady and expect to come last.
The race began with a sprite waving a green flag somewhere in the distance - my cue was a load of racers driving away from me, to be honest - and immediately I overtook four drivers, who promptly retired. Grand Prix Legends doesn't piss about.
I was in the last place, and the last place is where I would stay. I saw a yellow flag in the distance. Was he saying there was a chance I could gain a place? No. The flag was for me, as I lost concentration and span around the corner, backwards.
It wasn't for me. Another retiree sat up the road, waiting for me to pass, and just beyond that,
another yellow flag before the hairpin.
More retirements. More places gained, technically, but no overtaking. No racing. My competitors were away. Their skill was far beyond mine. The only overtaking I saw for the 8 lap race was everyone lapping me. Sometimes twice.
On the plus side, I was able to simulate blue flag conditions.
The race appeared to continue beyond its finish, with my team eventually deciding to call me into the pits. I don't know why. I'd crashed a lot, of course, but maybe it was just to call me in and get me out of the car because driving clearly isn't for me.
Final Word
What is for me, however, is Grand Prix Legends. I'm sure I'm swayed by these graphics more than the gameplay, which I shouldn't be given that they aren't original, but the whole package seems to be a winner.
You don't have to be a fan of Formula 1 or its history in order to appreciate the detail that has gone into Grand Prix Legends. It helps if you know the gist of things, sure, but you can drop into a race whenever you like and, true to the box blurb, get scared at going sideways when you really didn't want to.
It's magnificent, it's glamorous, it's a celebration of the good old days of racing, but by God is it a monster that needs taming in order to get something out of it. You need to put in the hours to hone your skills with this one, or your race will be undone in an instant. It's definitely on the simulator end of the arcade/simulator spectrum, and I wouldn't have it any other way.
If I could find it for 9p, I'm sure you can find it too. Get it, get the fancy fan-made updates and get racing. Just ignore the sprites.
Fun Facts
Despite the critical acclaim, Grand Prix Legends' sales figures were described as 'abysmally poor'. Still made it to the 1001 list, though.
Grand Prix Legends, developed by Papyrus Design Group, first released in 1998.
Version played: PC, 1998 (via GPLPS mods, 2016).