Toy Racer

Released on 22nd December, 2000 by Developers No Cliche and published by Sega, Toy Racer was a low budget game and an extension of Toy Commander. It was a title similar to Micro Machines V3 on the Playstation where players raced tiny toy cars, tanks, camper vans, jeeps, etc around tracks littered with giant every day objects such as milk bottles and pencils.
It was quite a passable title with a wide range of vehicles to throw about the twisty circuits. But it is those circuits which helped let the title down in that there were only four of them. Okay one might argue that being an expansion pack (and made on a low budget) you can forgive Toy Racer's miserly offering but surely a few more different tracks were possible? Having just four spreads the replayability a little whippet..a tad thin.
However on the (big) plus side we must remember that this game was one of the first to offer online gaming due to the Dreamcast's nifty internet capability. Toy Racer was the FIRST ever title that I (and no doubt thousands of others) played online and I still remember logging onto the game hub as if it was yesterday. As it was a 4 player I waited in the hub for around 5 minutes for the other 3 to show up and when they did, when I actually saw that I was going to be racing against other gamers from all over Europe it hit me; this online gaming lark is going to be HUGE!
I think my first race consisted of a German, a French guy, an English chap and Welsh ME. It was all so new and at first we kicked our heels in the hub until someone tapped in the words LET'S RACE! and off we went, 4 gamers at the dawn of online gaming (easy tiger. Dramatic Ed) and glad to say that after a good start by Germany, the Welsh succeeded in nailing the trophy.
So while I can moan about lack of circuits, it really doesn't matter because Toy Racer was about more than racing small cars, it was on the first wave of gaming via the internet giving excited players the first taste of what was to come. And for that it will always have a special place in my heart. (there you go again. Dramatic Ed)
So not much to do if you play solo, (you can't even race AI controlled cars!) and there is only Time Attack and Practice modes but this game was a blast in the beginning of the online trend.