My dad, for a time not long ago, had a Ford Fairlane that he would drag race with. Legal drag racing at a track, and just for fun. So, when I noticed one of the cars in Street Rod is a 1957 (his was a 1967) two-door Fairlane 500, I texted him a picture.

“The cheap price most indicate [sic] a 6 cylinder as opposed to the highly sought after 427 engine :),” he replied.

After learning my way around the interface, I discovered the engine was indeed a V8 rather than six. I soon found to dig a bit deeper. I texted back, “Oh, it’s a 292 cu. in.”

“There may be some mods required,” he replied.

SOME MODS REQUIRED

I’m not entirely sure what prompted me to get into 1989’s Street Rod. I heard about it, did a small bit of research, then booted up the Amiga version. I’m not much of a gearhead, though my substantial time in My Summer Car has certainly improved my knowledge of car anatomy. At the moment, I don’t even have a driver’s license. Don’t get the wrong idea – I didn’t lose it; I just never really had one.

I didn’t really know what I was getting into here. The MobyGames description of the game, however, paints an interesting picture. It focuses heavily on the game’s UI, which features a garage where you change out parts and a gas station that you drive to. If you don’t fill your tank up quickly and put the handle back, the full-service guy wakes up from his nap and charges you double. When you visit the diner, you wait for various motorheads in their souped-up cars to pull up and meet your gaze. Then you challenge them on the post.

Oh, yeah. That’s what drew me in. A racing game is whatever. Seen ‘em. Ones where you crash, ones where you explode other people, ones where you lob turtle shells at each other. Whatever. Give me something like My Summer Car, where racing is just one part of the whole. I don’t want to be a car; I want to play as the person in the car.

IT’S LONG, AND SLICK, AND OLIVE GREEN

I’ve always touted the effectiveness of mundane elements as a way of grounding a game. Nathan Drake would be a lot more relatable if we got to see him crawl into bed after a long and harrowing adventure. Hotline Miami wouldn’t be nearly as effective if you didn’t need to walk back to your car, past all your carnage in quiet contemplation just to finish a level. It’s ironic, but games without boring parts are less interesting than the ones that just focus on their central action.

Street Rod clearly had this figured out in 1989. It aims to be something of a ‘60s American car culture simulator. The end goal of the game is to beat The King in a drag race and a street race. The guy drives around in a 1963 Corvette with a gold-plated supercharger and trim. At least, I hope that’s plating, otherwise that car must weigh a tonne.

You start off with a small amount of money; just enough to buy a well-loved used car. From there, you make bets and try to win street races to get money to buy upgrades for your car. You can also compete for pink slips, which is to say, ownership of an opponent’s car. It’s the best way to make money, since they sell for thousands. You drive to the local diner, wait for the least impressive car to pull up, then crush them in a race to gain ownership. It’s a really quick way to reach the endgame.

YOU DON’T NEED TO TIP AN UNCONCIOUS PERSON

One of the cool features of Street Rod is the way it handles upgrades. If you buy a new engine, you need to pop the trunk, unscrew and remove the carburetor, unscrew and remove the manifold, then unscrew and unplug the engine before removing it. Then, you need to put it back together in reverse. There’s a real tactile element to modifications, which makes your relationship with your car more tangible. You can also remove the bumpers and chop the roof. Also, you’re able to change out the transmission.

It’s not too deep; this was on 1989 home computers. There aren’t really all that many parts to work with. Get yourself a pink slip, and you’ll likely have enough to get your car fully upgraded. Wear and tear does affect most of the parts, so in order to keep your top speed up, you’ll need to replace them occasionally. You can resell the old parts for a large chunk of their value, so as long as you’re winning races, it isn’t hard to maintain your car, but it does give more reason to keep diving under the hood.

RUBBING IS RACING

The actual races are less exciting. While it’s all presented from behind the dashboard and depicts the tracks in 3D, it’s what you’d expect from the era. You can probably count the frames per second on one hand. There is no music or engine noise when you’re driving (at least on the Amiga version). There’s very little scenery, and the road itself isn’t much more than asphalt.

Even with the fastest car possible, it’s easy to stay on the road. Most of the challenge comes from trying not to blow your engine. This isn’t possible using an automatic transmission, but if you’re driving stick, you’ll need to watch your RPMs. It’s extremely easy to redline in top gear, and if you maintain it there for too long, your engine explodes and needs to be replaced. The only way to avoid it is to let off the gas every few seconds, which can be pretty difficult when you’re watching your opponent head toward the horizon.

You can, of course, crash, but the most likely reason that might happen to you is if you slam into the back of your opponent. Unsurprisingly, it’s hard to gauge distance when the cars are completely 2D.

HARD DRIVIN’ BUT BORING-ER

Really, though, the worst part about Street Rod isn’t its lack of depth in the racing department (here’s a good time to note there’s only one track). No, it’s the load times. Listen, I really relate to Street Rod’s menus, because this is how responsive I usually am before my morning nap. However, they aren’t much fun to navigate. For example, if you want to unscrew the carburetor, you click its screw twice (slowly), then watch it fall to the bottom of the screen. Then you’ll hear the disk drive click and grumble for a few seconds, and finally, the carburetor disappears.

That happens for pretty much everything you do in the menus of Street Rod. To be fair, you can apparently install it to the hard drive, but it says you have to do that manually and I really don’t know how. Also, there’s a good chance you can work some magic on an emulator and cut out those loading times, but I like the full excruciating experience. Is that my problem? Also, maybe this isn’t a problem in the DOS version.

Aside from that, you can say what you want about the actual racing in Street Rod. It’s like a boring-er version of Hard Drivin’. But that’s not what’s important. The important thing is that Street Rod understood in 1989 that the experience is sometimes the most important part of a video game. Not the comfort of the experience but the tangibility of it. Even the simplest of core designs can be lifted by a good framework. And that’s what Street Rod has: a good framework. Just not a great one.

7/10

This review was conducted using the PCAU Amiga emulator and a digital version of the game. The game is available for free on the copyright owner’s page right here. As an additional note, there is some inaccuracies in reference to the 427 engine, which was not in Ford Fairlanes until 1964 (I believe) and wouldn’t have been in a 1957 model. Trust me, he knows his stuff, he probably just didn’t look closely at the screenshot.