Ridge Racer 2 MAME 2 Player Link-Up (Game 1)

Channel:

MrThunderwing

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Published on November 4, 2021 8:54:22 PM ● Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCPVg4UN_Ho

Game:

Ridge Racer 2 (1994)

Duration: 7:23

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So, whilst I had my mate Mark over the other night to play some 2 Player Sega Rally 2 in Supermodel (as it's only just been made playable in multiplayer), I decided to try another link-up game in a different emulator for the first time with an actual human opponent - Ridge Racer 2 in MAME.

Despite the fact that Sega Rally 2 is a far more technologically advanced game than Ridge Racer 2, because of the difference in the way MAME emulates games to Supermodel, my PC actually has a harder time running Ridge Racer 2. Also, whereas Supermodel will allow you to use multiple Xinput joypads on all the different Windows you have open with the game in (on a single PC network), the Global Inputs option in MAME only allows for one Joypad on the emulator that's 'in focus' and the other player(s) have to use the keyboard.

I've actually managed to successfully do a full speed 3 player game of Virtua Racing this way.
https://youtu.be/er0oWUhrFL8

Despite not seeming much more advanced than VR though, my PC was struggling running two versions of RR2 as you can tell by the stuttery music. In the first game, I decided to give Mark the advantage of playing with the pad (the left screen) whilst I took the keyboard (the right screen). What I wasn't expecting though was for him to go zooming off and totally leave me in his dust! I thought I was just playing shit because of the keyboard (which would stop responding after awhile if you just kept pressing down on the accelerator key for too long), It wasn't until the third game, when we swapped and I put him on keyboard and I took the controller, that I realised just how much faster P1's version of MAME was running than P2, something I then confirmed afterwards when reviewing the gameplay and seeing how much slower the countdown was on the P2 machine. I guess that also explains why, when the time ran out on P1, there wasn't a gameover initially (although it did eventually happen on the third lap).

Really crazy that both games were able to keep running in sync despite the difference in speed between them and that this translated onto the P1 machine as P2 just going really slowly.

Anyway, fun little experiment. You can download this version of MAME yourself from here: http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=165638.0
It's a non-official special build. There's instructions in the thread on how to get the link-up working.

#RidgeRacer #MAME #ArcadeRacer

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