We all make mistakes!

Iun’s Gaming Regrets offered us an insight into several of our very own Iun Hockley’s missteps in the world of gaming throughout his life but we all have skeletons in the closet.

Anyone who followed The 12 Days of Christmas over the festive period will be aware of the fun my brother and I had following the receipt of a Game Boy and the first two Super Mario Land games in 1995. As strange as it may seem two decades on, those remain the ONLY games we ever owned for the system (and I’m fairly certain my cousin lost the original, much to our frustration)

That same cousin, however, gave us our first taste of Wave Race on the Game Boy having allowed us to borrow it following its 1997 release in Europe.

To refer to the first instalment in the Wave Race franchise as ‘Micro Machines on jet skis’ may be a little unfair but it gives you plenty of an idea of what to expect. Racing around a selection of watery tracks against the clock with three opponents was relatively fun, with a top-down camera keeping up with the action.

The original Wave Race is one that I don’t remember all that well, having never owned it, so it’s particularly disappointing to me that I’ve never been able to explore it, or indeed it’s multiplayer mode, again on the 3DS Virtual Console, a game that I unfortunately can’t imagine making it to the service at this point.

The Nintendo 64 came and went, offering up hundreds of hours of entertainment across numerous amazing titles but I never had the opportunity to experience Wave Race 64 at the time. While this has most certainly been rectified in more recent years, it’s a little bit of a shame that I never got to have my mind blown by the incredible physics and water effects back in the late ‘90s. Despite that, the game looks and plays great to this very day.

With a selection of four racers to choose from, consisting of Ryota Hayami, Ayumi Stewart, Miles Jeter and the absolute beast that was Dave Mariner, there was just enough variety for everyone to find a rider they were comfortable with. Additionally, each could be customised to a minor degree before racing in order to provide a better balance of speed and control.

Competing through championships ranging from Normal to Expert difficulties, as well as a Reverse mode for only the most skilled, you’ll find Wave Race 64 to be a refreshing take on the racing genre as you battle against the waves in an attempt to weave between red and yellow buoys on your quest for 1st place. With the other riders, not least Dave Mariner, doing their best to knock you off balance and destroy your racing line, the game provides an exceptional challenge that requires practice to truly master. The satisfaction of placing well on a course you may normally struggle with is well worth the effort, though!

Blue Storm is Miles Jeter..

All of the fun I have had with Wave Race 64, however, has come several years after falling in love with the Gamecube sequel, Wave Race: Blue Storm. Perhaps it is for this reason I, unlike the seeming majority, rank Blue Storm higher than its N64 counterpart despite both being incredibly fun games. While Blue Storm’s character roster may have excluded Miles Jeter, the riders who did make the cut were performing in a game that I consider to be miles better.

As embarrassing as this wordplay may turn out to be, it can’t compare to the shame that will soon follow.

The first time I would ever see my now beloved Wave Race: Blue Storm in action would be via a promotional VHS attached to NGC Magazine, a firm favourite of mine following the excellent N64 Magazine. The internet was still in its relative infancy so, for me at least, it was rare to see game footage outside of TV shows of the 1990s, such as Games Master and Bad Influence, without purchasing the game and seeing it with your own eyes.

Having witnessed the beautiful Wave Race: Blue Storm in motion, it always stood out as one of the Gamecube launch titles I craved in 2002. At one point, I felt it would be THE game I would buy when picking up the system but the release of the console came almost 5 months after I somewhat enviously looked on as my friends wowed me with Pro Evolution Soccer on PS2. I have always leaned towards Nintendo throughout my entire life but in the latter years of the PS1 and throughout the PS2 lifespan, ISS Pro Evolution 2 and the Pro Evolution Soccer series were games that I was gutted not to be able to own on my N64 and Gamecube.

It was partly for this very reason that my first Nintendo Gamecube game would end up being Konami’s ISS 2. Being a fan of the N64 games, particularly International Superstar Soccer 98, I knew I’d at the very least have some great competitive multiplayer with friends and hoped that it may surpass what we had played in the previous few months on PS2. It didn’t, but ISS 2 was still an enjoyable football game at the time.

Anyway, as a 14 year old at the time, I had been saving up my own money for months to be able to buy the console myself on my 15th birthday that May, 12 days after it officially launched in Europe. My parents must have been feeling particularly generous in 2002 as they surprised me with the console, a second controller and ISS 2 meaning that I could use some of the money I had saved to buy more games for the system! Surely Wave Race: Blue Storm would be my next game of choice.

Wanting a racing game, my brother and I somehow decided that Burnout was the one to opt for from the selection available. It was a great game, no doubt about that, but what would it mean for Wave Race?

A few days later, we decided to add yet another game to the collection but since we already owned a racing game, my brother and I decided to branch out into the world of Super Monkey Ball. Again, this was a very fun game and I honestly didn’t feel bad about my purchases. Considering how much of a Nintendo fan I have been since the mid-90s, though, ignoring games such as Luigi’s Mansion, Wave Race: Blue Storm and Pikmin seems bizarre in hindsight.

Several months later, I eventually bought it and it was worth the wait. WHAT A GAME!

The graphics looked so much cleaner and crisper than they ever possibly could on an old VHS and the gameplay was nothing short of sublime. The Gamecube controller was always very comfortable but Wave Race: Blue Storm felt like it was absolutely made to be played with this controller with the feeling of the throttle and crashing through the waves perfectly brought to life with the excellent force feedback. Leaning into tight turns around buoys, rocks and other obstacles was a thing of precision and beauty thanks to the analogue shoulder buttons and everything just felt right.

As amazing as the controls are, however, this is not an easy game! Whilst I may be able to navigate the courses with a certain level of skill these days, there’s a learning curve to the experience and one that basically shot down any possibility of multiplayer fun with friends, given that it takes time to become accustomed to the gameplay and be confident in your abilities.

The Championship mode is where the real meat of the game is as you compete with seven CPU riders for supremacy in a variety of beautiful locations. Each course provides a significant challenge throughout each unlockable difficulty with changing water levels offering different challenges in each lap. However, weather plays a hugely important role in Wave Race: Blue Storm and one that elevates this racing experience above most others.

With sun, fog, rain and heavy storms all affecting the way each of the 8 courses play, it’s vital to plan your route through the championship with the aid of the 2-day forecast and an ability to select which course you wish to play on that particular day. I always saw Ocean City Harbour as my best chance of a 1st place finish so would often save it for a stormy day! The more skilled you get at the game, however, the more relaxed you will be about which course you will play on any given day and may actively seek out the most treacherous conditions for the trickiest courses just to embrace the challenge and see how you deal with it. Blue Storm can, therefore, be a highly exhilarating experience!

Why, then, did I disown it?

It’s a question I still ask myself to this day but I believe it boils down to a lack of money in my early to mid-teens and basically needing to trade in games in order to experience others. Having missed Luigi’s Mansion at launch, I picked it up several months later at the expense of Wave Race: Blue Storm, a game I felt, at that point at least, I’d just about mastered and seen everything I was ever going to see in it, even if I never really got into the stunt mode!

Again, Luigi’s Mansion was fabulous but a few weeks down the line, I began to regret offloading Wave Race. It wasn’t that I didn’t enjoy Luigi’s ghostly adventure, it was more that it hit me just how special of a game I had let go in order to pick it up in the first place. I had traded in a jet ski for a vacuum cleaner!

OOOH.. A TURBO!

I did eventually make up for my mistake by purchasing Blue Storm for the exact same value as what I exchanged it for all those months ago. I may not have been hit financially by this scenario but I still feel guilt and remorse, so much so that I almost feel like I deserve to be mocked and ridiculed by the sarcastic pit chief, unlockable via the options menu thanks to a cheat code.

Despite the error of my ways, I fell in love with Wave Race: Blue Storm and, indeed, its N64 prequel. There’s absolutely no doubt in my mind that if we are lucky enough to get a brand new version on Wii U or NX, I’ll be there on day one in my wetsuit!