Power Drift

For the Saturn version, see Sega Ages Power Drift.

n/a

Power Drift
System(s): Sega Y Board, Amiga, Amstrad CPC, Atari ST, Commodore 64, IBM PC, MSX, PC Engine, ZX Spectrum
Publisher: Sega Enterprises, Ltd. Asmik Activision (UK) MCM Software (ES)
Developer: Studio 128 Copya System Software Studios New Frontier
Genre: Racing
Number of players: 1
Release Date RRP Code JP 1988-08-05 ¥? ? US 198x $? ? JP 1990-04-13 ¥¥6,900 AS02002 {{#ifeq: 0 | 0 | UK 1989-12 £24.9924.99 UK (The Hit Squad) 199x £7.997.99 UK 1989-12 £19.9919.99 UK (The Hit Squad) 199x £7.997.99 ES (Cassette) 19xx AMC 768 UK (Cassette) 1989-12 £9.999.99 UK (Disk) 1989-12 £14.9914.99 UK (The Hit Squad) 199x £3.993.99 US (Disk) 1990 $39.9539.95 UK (Cassette) 1989-12 £9.999.99 UK (Disk) 1989-12 £14.9914.99 UK (The Hit Squad) 199x £3.993.99 IT (1) 19xx ES (Cassette) 199x LYSEC-714 UK (Cassette) 1989-12 £9.999.99 UK (The Hit Squad) 19xx £3.993.99 US 1989 UK 1990 £29.9929.99 ES 1989

Power Drift (パワードリフト) is a 1988 kart racing game developed for the Sega Y Board arcade platform. It was designed by Yu Suzuki and developed by his team at Sega AM2.

Gameplay

Like many games for the hardware, Power Drift makes heavy use of sprite scaling and rotation, often referred to as Super Scaler technology. It is one of the more ambitious efforts for what is considered at its core to be "2D" hardware, attempting not only to simulate driving down a road (like OutRun), but hills and bridges, as well as a camera which can tilt as the player drives around corners.

In Power Drift the player chooses one of twelve characters and attempts to beat them over the course of five "courses", labeled A through E, each with five tracks. Unlike most Sega arcade racers which rely on an in-game timer to determine whether a user has failed, in Power Drift the player must finish third or above in a race to continue playing.

If the player finishes first in all races, a sixth "special" track is unlocked, where the player has the option to play as the F-14 Tomcat from After Burner (A, C, E) or the motorbike from Super Hang-On (B, D).

Drivers

	Michael
	Keith
	Jason
	Storoganoph
	Tom
	Mark
	Jimmy
	Emily
	Lucy
	Jeronimo
	Harry
	Eric

History

Power Drift was the first kart racing game, predating Nintendo's Super Mario Kart by four years. While less known in America, it was critically and commercially successful in Europe, according to gaming magazines of its time.

Improving on the "Super Scaler" technology and road scrolling effects of Hang-On, Out Run and After Burner, it created all of its track layouts with flat bitmaps to simulate a wholly 3D space using strictly 2D technology, making much use of sprite-scaling and rotation to create a 3D effect.

Legacy

Unlike other works by Yu Suzuki, such as Space Harrier, OutRun, and After Burner, Power Drift skipped most home consoles and did not appear on a home Sega system until the release of a Sega Saturn conversion in 1998 (as Sega Ages Power Drift). It was instead ported to the PC Engine in Japan (by Asmik Ace Entertainment), and a variety of home computers in North America and Europe, including the Amiga, Amstrad CPC, Atari ST, Commodore 64, IBM PC, MSX, PC Engine and ZX Spectrum. All computer versions sacrifice many of the sprite effects, and though some were well received by the gaming press at the time, the limitations turn these versions into very different games.

The arcade version of Power Drift was also included in Yu Suzuki Game Works Vol. 1 for the Sega Dreamcast. The arcade version has never been re-released in the western world.

Unusual for Sega's "Super Scaler" arcade games, Power Drift was never ported to the Mega Drive console. Dempa Micomsoft was planning to port the game to the Mega Drive, but it was later moved to the Sega CD, before the project was eventually cancelled. When Dempa's license expired, Sega briefly worked on a Sega 32X version, which also did not see the light of day.

The Sonic Drift games for the Sega Game Gear handheld console were based on the gameplay of Power Drift, but with characters from the Sonic the Hedgehog series.

A remastered version was released by M2 and Sega for the Nintendo 3DS as a part of M2's 3D Classics line under the name 3D Power Drift. This version is a port of the arcade version but with added functionality, such as 3D stereoscopic support and customizable controls.

Versions

Amiga and Atari ST versions

The Amiga and Atari ST versions were programmed simultaneously by Zareh Z. K. Johannes of Software Studios, better known by his alias, "ZZKJ". It is in some ways an evolution of ZZKJ's previous project; the Amiga and Atari ST ports of Super Hang-On.

Sega failed to give the team any of the arcade game's assets or source code, meaning artist Saul Marchese had to take "hundreds" of photos of the arcade machine in action, and watch footage of someone playing the game to the end. Due to the limitation of 16 colours per sprite, DEGAS Elite was used as the primary graphics editor.

Unlike Y Board hardware, both the Amiga and ST are incapable of natively scaling sprites, so to create the illusion of depth, all graphics had to be rendered at multiple sizes. A program written by ZZKJ allowed these sprites to be generated on the fly, with Saul touching them up before use.

The Amiga port is spread across two floppy disks, while the Atari ST port needs three. To reduce the amount of disk swapping, course graphics were stored on disk 3. Atari ST users also have to choose between music and sound effects, while the Amiga supports both simultaneously.

Code was written to allow Amiga and Atari ST users to compete against each other by using a null modem cable, but this feature was not implemented in the final product. Its existence would have made Power Drift the only Sega-to-computer port to adopt this feature, and indeed one of a small handful of games in the entire Amiga/Atari ST shared library to support it.

While the arcade version of the game targets 30FPS at all times, Power Drift on the Amiga and ST averages 6-7. Attempts to mitigate the choppy nature of play involved the manipulation of up to 50 sprites per frame.

The Amiga version is optimised to some degree for systems equipped with Motorola 68020 processors. At the time, only the Amiga 2500/20 from 1988 came with this processor out of the box - other Amiga computers would have to be upgraded.

Commodore 64 version

The Commodore 64 version of Power Drift was written by Chris Butler, following his conversion of Thunder Blade and being subsequently poached by Activision to work on new titles. Work began in February 1989 with a deadline of September, the contract had a £250 penalty clause for every week missed past this deadline.

The Commodore 64 version loads in one go, devoting roughly 32kB to graphics, 20kB to the game and 6kB to music. A further 1-3kB is reserved for "emergency backup purposes".

The game was written on an Amstrad PCW running WordStar, before being assembled by Avaset X-ASM. Priority was given to eliminating the "wobble" of graphics as they move into the screen (as seen with Butler's conversions of Thunder Blade and Space Harrier).

The development team only had the Power Drift cabinet for four months before it was sent elsewhere.

ZX Spectrum version

Power Drfit on the Spectrum was created by Software Studios, with programming by John Mullins and graphics by Clive Paul. On a 48K Spectrum, Power Drift is a multi-load game with each circuit being loaded individually, but if played on a 128K machine, everything loads in one go (and includes better music and sound effects).

Again, Sega did not provide the team with source code, meaning the game was created by watching videos and analysing screenshots.

The graphics are reduced to simple OutRun-style roads, where corners and hills are simulated, but the horizon is static and the camera does not rotate. The screen updates at about 8-10 frames per second, owing to the way the road moves up and down. For this reason, Power Drift is slower than Mullins' previous Spectrum conversion, WEC Le Mans.

Music was developed on an Atari ST.

Production credits

Main article: Power Drift/Production credits.

Magazine articles

Main article: Power Drift/Magazine articles.

Promotional material

Main article: Power Drift/Promotional material.

Photo gallery

• 

  Upright cabinet

• 

  Sit-down cabinet

• 

  Deluxe cabinet

• 

  Y Board CPU PCB (top)

• 

  Y Board CPU PCB (bottom)

• 

  Y Board Video PCB (top)

• 

  Y Board Video PCB (bottom)

• 

  Y Board Sound PCB (top)

• 

  Y Board Sound PCB (bottom)

Physical scans

Y Board version

Sega Retro Average
Publication Score Source

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Based on 0 review

Sega Retro Average
Publication Version Score (UK) 60 (DE) 77 (UK) 100

	79
Based on 3 reviews

Power Drift

Y Board, US
Manual

Y Board, JP

Amiga version

Sega Retro Average
Publication Score Source (UK) 83 №3, p76-77

	83
Based on 1 review

Sega Retro Average
Publication Version Score (UK) 65 (UK) 88 (UK) 92 (DE) 79 (UK) 69 (DE) 83 (UK) 72 (UK) 70 (UK) 83 (UK) 90 (FR) 77 (AU) 45 (UK) 78 (DE) 36 (UK) 85 (UK) 65

	74
Based on 16 reviews

Power Drift

Amiga, UK
Cover

Amiga, UK (The Hit Squad)
Cover

Amstrad CPC version

Sega Retro Average
Publication Score Source

{{{{{icon}}}|L}}
Based on 0 review

Sega Retro Average
Publication Version Score (UK) 91 (UK) 45

	68
Based on 2 reviews

Power Drift

Amstrad CPC, UK (cassette)
Cover

Amstrad CPC, UK (disk)
Cover

Amstrad CPC, UK (The Hit Squad)
Cover
Cassette

Amstrad CPC, ES (cassette)
Cover

Atari ST version

Sega Retro Average
Publication Score Source

{{{{{icon}}}|L}}
Based on 0 review

Sega Retro Average
Publication Version Score (DE) 83 (UK) 84 (FR) 77 (ES) 60 (UK) 50 (UK) 76 (UK) 83 (UK) 75

	74
Based on 8 reviews

Power Drift

Atari ST, UK
Cover
Disk 1 Disk 2 Disk 3

Atari ST, UK (The Hit Squad)
Cover

Commodore 64 version

Sega Retro Average
Publication Score Source

{{{{{icon}}}|L}}
Based on 0 review

Sega Retro Average
Publication Version Score (DE) 80 (UK) 73 (DE) 77 (UK) 87 (UK) 85 (UK) 41 (UK) 80 (SE) 70 (UK) 92 (UK) 100 (UK) 92 (UK) 80 (IT) 95

	81
Based on 13 reviews

Power Drift

Commodore 64, US
Cover

Commodore 64, UK
Cover
Cassette

Commodore 64, UK (The Hit Squad)
Cover
Cassette

Commodore 64, IT

IBM PC version

Sega Retro Average
Publication Score Source

{{{{{icon}}}|L}}
Based on 0 review

Sega Retro Average
Publication Version Score (UK) 80 (FR) 62 (FR) 35

	59
Based on 3 reviews

Power Drift

IBM PC, US
Cover
Disk 1 Disk 2 Disk 3 Disk 4

MSX version

MSX, ES

MSX, ES (alt)
Cover

PC Engine version

Sega Retro Average
Publication Score Source

{{{{{icon}}}|L}}
Based on 0 review

Sega Retro Average
Publication Version Score (UK) 60 (DE) 73 (UK) 69 (US) 86 (UK) 87 (FR) 53 (FR) 81 (DE) 59 (IT) 76

	72
Based on 9 reviews

Power Drift

PC Engine, JP
Cover
Card File:Power Drift PCE HuCard JP Manual.pdf Manual

ZX Spectrum version

Sega Retro Average
Publication Score Source

{{{{{icon}}}|L}}
Based on 0 review

Sega Retro Average
Publication Version Score (UK) 81 (UK) 71 (ES) 60 (YU) 53 (UK) 79 (UK) 81 (UK) 82

	72
Based on 7 reviews

Power Drift

ZX Spectrum, UK
Cover

ZX Spectrum, UK (The Hit Squad)
Cover

ZX Spectrum, ES
Cover

Unreleased versions

Power Drift
System(s): Sega Mega Drive, Sega Mega-CD
Publisher: Sega
Planned release date(s): 1991 1992-04, 1992-05, 1994-01

The game was apparently due to be ported to the Mega Drive and Mega-CD. The Mega Drive version was mentioned in the December 1990 issue of Mean Machines, with an expected release date of Easter 1991, and the Mega-CD version was announced shortly before the system launched, with an expected release of "late Spring" 1992 (April/May). Neither version ever came out.

Technical information

ROM dump status

System	Hash	Size	Build Date	Source	Comments
?	CRC32 25e0f6e9 MD5 c7f4c99ccb9f56ef954f3ccf332ce0db SHA-1 1ffe1111a570b0cca256a356965fd6cdf7bcf2e9	512kB		Card (JP)
?	CRC32 0a9ade99 MD5 130a6d649d4498d6998d60211a18a4db SHA-1 8e021703241c20ebd2a40ee55788c3a5fc4b8592	512kB		Card (JP)	(Alt)

References

NEC Retro has more information related to Power Drift