Story:

There are several different difficulty levels, and upon completion of some of them, you'll receive an upgrade for your car.

The default control setup (which can be changed) uses the Z button as the gas, and the R button (the top right shoulder button) as the brake. The sensitivity of the analog stick can be adjusted to suit your taste.

What's it like to play?:

I was very pleased to discover that the game looked and sounded just as I remembered from my brief play sessions at my local Fudruckers. The whole atmosphere of the game is very true to the arcade. It's very reminiscent of the 1980s arcade games like Out Run. It's kind of fun to play a game like that again in the '90s, but as with most games with a retro style, repetition and boredom can be expected after only a short time at the controls. The only new addition to the game is the two player mode. This surprises me, as I thought Nintendo was going to make sure arcade conversions for the N64 offered something genuinely new and different.

The control basically consists of you swerving to avoid oncoming obstacles on the way to the finish while hoping that you don't crash into too many things along the way. If you don't finish first, you'll have to do it all over again. If you feel you're swerving too little or too much, you can adjust the sensitivity of the analog stick.

It's kind of funny to see cars flip over the first few times it happens, but it gets old quickly. The graphics are very flat, and repeat later in the cross country race. I'm a little surprised at the K-A rating for the game due to all of the women dancing around in bikinis and miniskirts. Some of the sounds are kind of demeaning to women as well. This is not a game for impressionable six year old boys ;-)

The frame rate is sluggish, but so was the arcade's. In general, the low frame rate is only a problem in the two player mode where the game slows down considerably.

If you're bored some weekend, and feel like having some retrogaming fun, Cruis'n would be worth the money to rent, but it certainly isn't something you'd want to purchase at $70. It's not a horrid game, it's just that there's very little variety to it, and it just doesn't offer the N64 anything worthy of its power.