Speed Busters
Speed Busters (known in North America as Speed Busters: American Highways) is a video game developed by Ubisoft's Montreal studio for Microsoft Windows in 1998. It was released for the Dreamcast in 1999 as Speed Devils. It is a racing game in which the courses feature hazards such as dinosaurs rolling boulders, and UFOs in exotic locales including Louisiana, Louisiana Tornado, New York City, New York City Winter, Mexico, Nevada, Aspen Summer, Aspen Winter, Canada (Supposedly northern Quebec), Canada Light Winter, Canada Heavy Winter, Montreal Industrial, Hollywood, and Hollywood Disaster. The console version's career mode allowed  the player to rise themselves through the ranks of a fictional racing league. Colourful rivals challenge the player to accomplish certain feats during races, making accompanying bets using prize money from competition. Money earned from gambling and performance is used to buy cars, upgrade them, and maintain them. The game also supports five players on one Dreamcast console. Sega released Speed Devils Online Racing, an updated version of the game in 2000 for Dreamcast that added online play. Reception. "Speed Busters: American Highways" and "Speed Devils" received favourable reviews, while the mobile version of the latter received mixed reviews, according  to the review aggregation website GameRankings. "GameRevolution" wrote a review on the Dreamcast version, saying, "At the finish line, Speed Devils is an above-average racer, but not much more." The reviewer said the game had good graphics and cool cars but suffered from poorly made tracks that leave the player wondering how they managed to drive off a cliff without noticing the cliff in front of them. The article also criticized the game's two-player mode for being boring and drawn out. "Edge" gave the same console version seven out of ten, saying, "While not outstanding in any  particular regard, "Speed Devils" is good entertainment that should captivate anyone tired of realistic racers with its accessible and player-friendly arcade-like nature." Chris Charla of "NextGen" called the same console version "the best racing game you can find on Dreamcast today." In Japan, where the same console version was ported for release on November 18, 1999, "Famitsu" gave it a score of 29 out of 40. Nick Smith of "AllGame" gave "Speed Busters: American Highways" three-and-a-half stars out of five, saying, "You'll have a fast and furious time with "SpeedBusters" - but only if you  have a competent graphics card. If you've got a puny PC with little video memory, forget it." However, Jonathan Sutyak gave "Speed Devils" two-and-a-half stars out of five, saying, "if you can overlook the obstacles, or even enjoy them, you may get a kick out of some of the races. Although despite being able to run tracks in the opposite direction with some different obstacles "Speed Devils" becomes repetitive due to the long laps of each track and the weak computer opponents. They will try to block you sometimes when you try to pass and they  will also ram into you, but ultimately they do not provide an exceptional challenge." Speed Devils Online Racing. "Speed Devils Online Racing" received "generally favorable reviews" according to the review aggregation website Metacritic.