Have you had the chance to get into a Superior
Engineering Retail Store? I tell you what, it is well worth it. They have got steering arms, panhard rods,
they have got their Superflex arms. You want an Ironman fridge? They've got that for you. You want a bullbar? They've got that.
Whatever you need, get in here and check it
out. MSA seat covers. Make sure the mud doesn't get to your seat. They've also got all the other suspension
components, lighting components, navigation components, radios...
A man, the list just
goes on and on. You've got to get into a Superior Engineering
retail store and check it out. Go to their website Superior Engineering dot
com dot au, or drop into the store at Deception Bay. I'm Mad Matt.
I think that among the things that prevent us.. From acting is the fear of failure... And if you've already failed, you don't wanna fail again.. The pain of that..
The disappointment.. Many of us don't act because we want other people's approval We want everybody to like us and to accept us... We are settling for less than what we actually deserve... We don't feel good about it, but we make it work in our minds We will come up with some kind of excuse to make it alright.
Most people like to feel like they are "King" in the area of their comfort zone. They only wanna do those things that they know how to do well.. So there are many reasons why we don't act. The other thing though that affect us is that - Not wanting to take personal responsibility..
We want somebody else to do it and that's not possible.. And when you go through life like that... Something in you dies.. You need to start asking yourself some questions - What do I really really truly want? Don't wait around for things to be just right..
Don't wait for things to be perfect Don't wait for the ideal situation, it will never be ideal... Today this opportunity that you have - it might not be here next year, it might not be here the year after next.. It might not be here the year after that.. This is the only moment you got..
And what you will find then when you decide to act when you decide to take life on and let me warn you.. It can be painful... It will be uncomfortable and that's where the growth is Never be satisfied with yourself, always know that as you invest the effort and time on you.. That's the greatest ability that human beings have above animals.
See a dog can be anything but a dog.. Tree can be anything but a tree.. Human being you've got unlimited potential.. You can put effort on you and by concentrating on you and developing you...
You can transform your life wherever you are right now... Many people will leave the universe without a trace... No one will know they were here.. What will you leave, what will be different because you came this way? Listen to that still small voice within you Don't try and make everything logical There are some things about life that defies logic.
See there is some good out there for you in the universe.. That has your name on it and nobody can get your good it has your name on it... They can't take your stuff, it's your stuff.. So when you know that..
When you know that whatever you are seeking... Its also seeking you.. You don't worry, you don't run scared You don't think somebody is going to take it from you.. You've got to say - Yes.
- Yes to my dreams.. - Yes to me! Yes! I can make it.. Yes, I can. You don't need anybody to approve your dream..
It was given to you, if they can't see it it's because it wasn't given to them... It was given to you! You gonna get thrown to the ground again and again and again.... But when you have determination.. And you know that what you are doing is right..
It gives you YOUR LIFE. It gives a special meaning and power to you.. I REFUSED to be denied.. And I am gonna go all out..
I am going to be relentless.. I don't care how many No's I encounter.. Doesn't matter how many failures I've made.. Doesn't matter how many mistakes I've endured..
Doesn't matter about my defeats.. Doesn't matter about what I've done.. YES! YES! YES, I CAN! Hey guys, this is Charlie from MotivationGrid.. Now, we create alot about motivation here and we hope that you love these inspiring videos...
But up until now we haven't gone into the concrete actions that actually help you realise your full potential the steps that you can start taking right now to radiate unshakable confidence, and inspire, impress and energise the people that you come across every single day even if it's just for a minute that is all about to change... So if
you want to learn more about those exact steps to be the kind of person that
walks to the world radiating unshakable confidence then click the link here and
you'll be taken to a page where you can submit your email... It will immediately be taken to a
video that will show you one thing that you can start doing right now that will
take you from anxious to super confident inside of a minute so if you want to see
that video and you can hear more about what's coming go ahead and click the link now.
Wouldnt it be great if you and your friends
had access to an indoor track for fun and racing? A low-cost track that anyone could enjoy. DBoots Tires has a racing program for you.
Like parking lot racing, it offers you an easy and affordable way to attract drivers
in your area. And the ideas pretty much the same, except that the focus is on indoor
racing. You just set up a temporary track for a day or a whole weekend and then
tear it down until its time for the next race.
Its a type of racing thats been
popular in Europe for years, and is now starting to take North America by storm.
The advantages are huge: you can hold a race anytime, rain or shine. Since its temporary,
you can set it up fastand tear it down the same way. You can set it up almost any
way you want, almost anywhere want. And, with the unique chemistry of dBoots tires, you
can hold races on virtually any kind of surface.
Theyre
comparable to conventional tires in price, but outlast them by a factor of two or even
three to one. Theyre available for almost any 1/10 scale driving application. Short-course
as well as two-wheel drive and four-wheel drive off-road. In a medium A and softer B
compound.
And in a wide variety of tread patterns. DBoots markets NanoByte, TerraByte, MultiByte
and BlockPass treads under the dBoots brand, and nine additional tires for ARRMA vehicles
under the ARRMA brand. There are forty in all.
Sounds great, doesnt it? Well, heres something else youll like: you can develop
a successful dBoots racing program of your own even if you dont: have the room; a
big budget to work with, or any previous experience with racing programs. Heres what well
cover: location, materials, track types, racing classes.
Location.
First option: partner with a local hobby shop. Thats a natural choice. However,
if the retailer doesnt have room, look for places that do: community centers, churches
with basements, school gymnasiums, vacant stores, machine shops and more. Once thats
settled, youll need three other things: track-building supplies, a scoring/lap-counting
system and a positive attitude.
Have racers bring their own tables and chairs for pitting
and youre well on your way to scheduling your first race.
The track we set up for this video is roughly 30 feet by 60 feet. You may go with a small
oval track, or a sprawling carpet track for off-road, packed with jumps, bumps and obstacles.
The choice is yours. Setup and teardown can take as little as fifteen minutes.
Materials. For your scoring/lap-counting system, for instance, what we recommend is the Robitronic
Lap Counter System.
The price for the complete system, including three transponders, is under
three hundred and fifty dollars. Extra transponders are about forty dollars each. And both can
be ordered through your local hobby shop. And when it comes to track-building materials,
the sky and your imagination are the only limits.
You can use just about anything
to make your track fun and challenging. Take track barriers, for instance. We made ours
from 10-foot sections of plastic rain gutter, which are available at most building supply
stores for about a dollar a foot. You can use them as is, or dress them up with spray
paint, decals or even simple vinyl designs like the ones we used.
And heres what we used for driving surfaces: metal racks from old displays, plastic sheeting,
rubber mats, leftover wood flooring and one by twos we formed into a rumble section.
We
even included some prebuilt features jumps and table tops that we store between races.
Track Types: Cost is also affected by track type. Here are a few basic examples.
Oval: This requires only an outer barrier, a middle barrier and some plastic or dots
for the corners. Duct tape or sand bags are easy ways to keep the barriers in place. Oval
tracks are great for concrete, tile, wood or carpet.
Road-Course: this also requires an outer barrier, as well as several barriers inside to form
the course.
Lanes on our thirty by sixty track are ten feet wide. We used bolts to hold the
track together. Like oval tracks, road course layouts are great on concrete, tile, wood
or carpet. Off-Road: This off-road track uses the same
basic layout as the road course, but adds jumps, obstacles and a variety of driving
surfaces.
The more creative your layout, the more fun
you and your friends will have. Remember that the name of the layout doesnt need to limit
the types of vehicles that race on it. DBoots-style racing is geared
more towards the weekend warrior than the hardcore racer. As a result, you have a lot
more flexibility in setting up racing classes and track rules.
Here are a few suggestions
for racing classes: Off-Road Rookie: this class is great for drawing
in the wanna-be racer and getting them pumped up about racing. Often called the Run what
you brung class, it allows drivers to compete with any kind of vehicle, and against drivers
just like themselves. Off-Road Buggy: a class for all brands of
1/10 scale buggies, including the ARRMA RAIDER. MEGA desert buggy.
Off-Road Truck: like the buggy class, this class would be open to all brands of 1/10
scale trucks.
A great choice here is the ARRMA. VORTEKS BLX.
Off-Road Short Course: short course racing could easily turn out to be your most popular
racing class. There are a huge number of good short course trucks out there right now, including
this one the ARRMA FURY MEGA. On-Road and Oval: while off-road and short
course are hot tickets right now, dont forget that on-road and oval racing are popular
choices, too.
The popularity of these classes varies widely from place to place. The nice
thing is that you control the racing program, and can offer the racing classes you and your
friends want most. Finally, remember that vehicles in the same
racing class can still be wildly different in equipment and racing potential. One of
the best ways to level the playing field and ensure a more exciting race is to require
all drivers to use the same spec tire.
The unique chemistry and wide variety of dBoots
tires make them a great choice for any indoor surface.
In addition, theres no rule that says that you have to limit race day to only one class
of racing. If you start with road-course racing in the morning, you could add jumps and tables
to the existing course and offer off-road racing in the afternoon. Thats the beauty
of dBoots-style racing: since your track is temporary, you can change the layout every
time you set up, until you and your friends get just the track you want.
Well, there you have it: a racing program you can run year-round one that can be
just as simple, flexible and affordable as you want it to be. It gives drivers a great
place to drive for fun or racing and it gives people whod like to start driving
a great way to see what all the excitement is all about.
The fast track to easy, affordable fun is out there.
Open mic here, what is your stance on online retailing? Well, online retail is over-hyped and it's unfair in terms of all the overseas retailers selling into Australia and not paying their duties and GST and all the rest and it will all stop. The pity is that it will go for 3, 4, 5 years before it stops. But the stop period is slowly coming. It might probably be in the next few months even.
So the rest of the world doesn't do what we do. So if you go to the UK and you want to bring something in from overseas, you pay your 20% taxes, you pay your duties and I think even on smaller items, they have a surcharge as well sort of thing. We have a thousand dollars, and no one takes any notice of that. The thousand dollars becomes 2, 3, 4, 5 thousand because they send it in in parts, or the don't declare it or they get a bodgy invoice and all this sort of thing.
So it's an absolute rort. And there's no point to it except that some people get some cheaper stuff and put a whole lot of other people out of work. So sooner or later governments wake up to it and that's what's happening now. So, that part of it, the overseas thing will start to drop, when that all happens.
Then in Australia, online, that will start to grow. And so you will have this combination of online and bricks and mortar shops. So at the moment in Harvey Norman that online business is growing. We were doing 60 or 70 thousand dollars a day.
In December it got up to 300,000 dollars a day but now but now it will drop back to maybe 100/150 thousand dollars a day and that will just keep on growing. So what percentage of our business will it be in 1 years, 2 years, 5 years, 10 years? Everyone's having a guess at that and they don't know. At the moment, if you took instead of a Harvey Norman, maybe took a department store, it might be a bit better an example. A department store is 1 or less than 1 per cent of turnover.
Where can it get to? If it gets to 5 per cent it will be high. But a whole heap of people will tell you that it will get to 10 or 20 percent, I don't believe that. I think it's got a ceiling on it. But I am not sure what it is.
And if you take the department stores, there's only two really, David Jones and Myers, and if it gets to 5 per cent, that'll be 1 in 20 sales done online. I am battling to see how it will get much more than that but I don't discount the fact that it could get to 10 per cent, it could, but I don't ever see it getting any more. I just can see how it could get any more than that..
[Typewriter typing] Success is achieving something that you personally want to achieve. So it doesn't mean making money. It just means rising to the top of whatever it is that you aspire to rise to the top of. You know, a lot of people relate it to money.
Money is only a small part. Two mates are on a mission to figure out how
10 Aussie icons in completely different fields
broke away from the pack. We want to dig deeper,
see if anyone can do what theyve done and figure out their common thread. [Theme music] Gerry Harvey is the undisputed retail king
of Australia.
At 22 the door-to-door vacuum salesman
dropped out of university to co-found Norman Ross. With over $240 million in sales the business
was taken over by Alan Bond who made the two founders redundant. But shortly after, they started Harvey Norman
which went on to become the best performing stock on the ASX for 20 years since listing. The business now boasts 230 stores in eight countries and Harvey has accumulated more than $1.5
Billion in personal wealth.
Here we are on the Gold Coast at the Magic
Millions horse sales. One of the many jewels in the crown of Australias
retail king. So lets get in there! Following our first episode with Gai Waterhouse,
the horse trainer, we were back at it. This time at Australias major horse auction,
the Magic Millions, which Gerry owns.
While he may be known for Harvey Norman, he also happens to be the worlds largest racehorse breeder. We were beginning to think horse racing was
a thread. It was here, in a small back office, where
we managed to secure Gerrys time. I was really keen to talk about your salesmanship,
Gerry.
How did you first get into door-to-door sales? It was like desperation. There's nothing in me that wants me to- you
know, where I want to go knocking on doors selling
vacuum cleaners. I can't think of anything I hate more. But what did happen, the opportunity, when
I saw that, you know, I could open a business and then I saw what I could do then.
I thought that was when the doors started
to open. I think 'wow' so my head's running. There was potential there. I can see potential in lots of things but
a lot of other people can't see maybe.
But I can execute it too. A lot of people see potential but they can't
execute it. So when you were rebelling and going down
this different path, were your family supportive of you? No, family got no friggin money. How can they be supportive of me? I'm gone.
Okay? I was living in a garage. We've got a family of 5 living in a room twice
as big as this. I'd gone from being a fairly wealthy little
kid to a very poor little kid. Yeah so it was just me.
You're on your own. You said that your old man was a bit of a
scoundrel, in an interview. In just that he threw his money away a bit. Yep.
Did that ever motivate you? Yeah, sure, because my father was one of about
eight or nine kids and his father was a very very wealthy man. And when his father died, he left my father
less than all the other kids because he thought he'd just waste it. And he was right, he wasted it. And so, you know, that motivates you to...To
not be like that.
It's a strong motivation. As we picked up in our last episode with Gai,
parents who let you take risks is one of the threads we see throughout. While Gerrys parents werent able to
support him financially, he was able to take risks. He decided to drop-out of his commerce degree
at university and quit his part time job to sell vacuum
cleaners door-to-door.
He quickly expanded his reach by opening shops
selling white goods, furniture and electronics. We wanted to know where this ability to sell
came from. Is someone born a salesman or do they pick
up these tips along the way? Some people can never be a salesperson. They just can't.
Doesn't matter how many books you study, how
many people you watch, you can't do it. Some people can be a great salesperson and
they never knew they were. They just have something. Like if you're coming in to see me and we're
going to have an interview I've got to get the gut feeling that you've
got it.
Now, one, I want to look at you and decide
whether people will like you, whether you've got a happy outlook on life,
okay. Or you're one of those people that can get
sour, and you have moods, or whatever it is. I want someone whos got enthusiasm, energy
and a good outlook. That sort of person, you can do something with.
If you've got that ability, you're very lucky. You can give me a shop, and you can have a
another shop over there. Were both square okay. You can have all the top staff right? Ill have none.
Ill go out find mine and train them and
Im going to beat you, okay? And Ill back myself to do that every time. Because Ill get those people and I just
want enthusiastic people. Im a good enough leader to be able to beat
that bloke. Maybe I cant beat everyone but Ive got
that confidence that I can.
I dont want a shop in Australia, in any
town, where I am not the best shop in town. This is why, perhaps, they call him the
retail king. With Gerry, it isnt enough just to be very
good. Hes highly competitive and wants to be
the best.
We would see this when his first business
was taken over and he decided to start all over again, launching
Harvey Norman at the age of 42. We're going to open seven days a week. And we're going to give all their prices and pizzling. Mainly because we don't keep wasting our money taking over other people's businesses.
How do you think Alan Bond and John Walton will like this? Why don't you come and have a look? Maybe you shouldn't have sacked my after all. Or maybe you should buy this place too. Harvey and Norman, starting all over again,
7 days a week, Paramatta Road, Auburn. So would you find it's that passion or being a people person that's more important to be a successful business person? If you want to be a successful business person,
one, you'll have to have the passion.
Two, youll have to have the work ethic. And three, you probably have to have the ability
to get people to work for you and want to work for you and then work for
you as a team. But if you have a lot of business acumen,
you're very good, but you are not a good peoples person,
that's going to be very difficult for you. Very difficult.
[Harvey Norman theme music] Who would you say has been your biggest role
model? When I was a 20 year old, 19 year old, I used
to spend a lot of times with guys who were 30, 40, 50, 60. Successful people. And try to figure out then what the hell have
I got to do to be as successful as this bloke. Older people will spend the time with you.
As long as they sense that you are trying
to get ahead and you're interested. I was mixing with the best businessmen in
the country between 20 and 30. Thats a learning phase you can get between
20 and 30 you probably can't get between 30 and 40 and it's nearly impossible between 40 and 50. Why is that? Because you get to set in your ways.
Whatever happens to us all it's a very rare
person that doesn't walk a narrow corridor and become fairly set in their ways. And people come to me and say, I'm still
young. I'm 30 and, you know, I've got this great
ambition. And I say, Mate you're probably not going
to make it, sorry.
Why not? Well, because youve buggered around,
you haven't done anything much and you're 30. Youre probably not going to make it. You'll be competing with blokes that have
been doing it for 10 years and you're going to start now? The ones that are most successful are the
ones who have been doing it for a long time, early. We covered a lot of ground with Gerry that
morning in our 3 hour interview.
This point definitely struck a chord though
- the idea of having a go while youre young and not waiting for tomorrow. Its almost as if his rationale for starting
early was to get a head start on his competitors. As if hes been in his own race to the top. We wanted to know more.
In other interviews youve said that the
majority of your success is really because youve gone through the
right doors at the right time. How can you explain that fantastic foresight
and then explain it away with luck? I don't want to get too carried away with
my own ability because I want to be more realistic about it. And I really honestly believe luck plays a
bigger part than most people give it credit for. You need that bloody door to open at the right time.
That little opportunity and you can exploit it. Do you think someone like Warren Buffet is lucky? Sure. I think every wealthy blokes lucky unless
they were left money and then they're still lucky. But yeah, I don't think any of us should ever
get carried away with, you know, 'We did it and no one else could have'.
Like Bill Gates, if the computer industry
didn't exist, would Bill Gates be who he is today? Highly doubtful. We werent too sure if this was just Gerrys
competitive instincts coming out or whether he truly believed luck played a
big role in his life. Because he does claim his own gut feel, not
luck, is the key to surrounding himself with talented people. But, you can see why people want to work for him.
For a billionaire, hes never lost the common touch. I don't try to be someone Im not. And a lot of people do get out of that. They start to become self important which is one of the greatest disease that youll ever get, self importance.
It's a horrible thing to happen to you. But you've got to know there are lots of people
a lot smarter than you all day, every day. And so don't ever get too confident about
how much you know. You said before that you don't pretend to
be something that you're not, but you are in the spotlight a fair bit.
Have you been able to successfully manage the media? Yeah, I think I manage the media okay. Because I am talking to the media, if not
every day, every week. And I know exactly how the media thinks. So if you're talking to the media you want
to try and help them get the headline.
And you've got to get the media to like you
and you've got to get the media to respect you. The medias got to believe what you are
about a bit, people in the media. But if they take a dislike to you, you treat
them badly or something, they can go and write these horrible stories
about you all the time. They're out to get ya.
And so somehow or other you've got to get them onside. Its very difficult. [Harvey Norman theme music] How big a burden is that constant pressure to perform? That's the thing that drives me, I guess. Because I ask myself, Do you need the money mate? Why are you doing this? Because it's a bloody challenge, that's why.
Beginning of every day, you look at it and
think to yourself, you know, I want to be relevant, I want to be out there,
and I want to do things. I might be physically old but I don't want
to get mentally old. All those sort of things I am living the life
of a 40-50-year-old and that's important to me. I don't want to live the life of a 70-year-old
because most of them live a horrible bloody life.
They're happy but not my sort of happiness. I think you just get up every day, do the
best you can and go to bed at night and say, I gave it my best shot. What else can you do? I'm giving it my best shot, I'm going nowhere
but they are - get out. So I've got to recognise if that day comes
where they're doing it and Im not, that is the day I've got to go.
Gerrys a gifted salesman with a good outlook
on life whos made the most of his opportunities. But what interested us the most was how hed continually compared his decisions to his peers throughout life. It was almost as if his mantra was, yes, work hard but work harder than your peers on the things
youre good at and passionate about. This kind of competitive drive was a thread
we saw run through the others we sat down with too.
Gerry, you're someone that has great focus
and follows their gut so we got you a little token of our appreciation. It's a set of blinkers. So, I've had blinkers on all my life and youre
the first guys that recognise it. Thank you..
GENERATION BUT THOSE
JOBS ARE HARD TO FIND.
HERE'S JO LING KENT. >> I HATE WORKING THE
THEATER.
ALL THE ACTION'S ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE
MALL.
>> Reporter: THAT SUMMER JOB AT THE
MALL, ONCE A TEENAGED
RITE OF PASSAGE NOW MAY BECOME A THING OF
THE PAST.
>> I'VE SENT OUT APPLICATION AFTER
APPLICATION.
>> Reporter: THIS 20-YEAR-OLD IS RACING
TO FIND A POSITION
BEFORE SUMMER'S IN FULL SWING.
SHE WORKED RETAIL LAST
SUMMER.
>> DEPARTMENT STORES,
I'VE DONE SNEAKER
JOBS, WOMAN'S CLOTHING.
>> Reporter: THERE'S A
NEW REALITY FOR TEENS NATIONWIDE WITH MORE
RETAIL STORES CLOSING
ACROSS THE COUNTRY AND A BOOM IN ONLINE
SALES.
MORE STORES AT MALLS LIKE THIS ONE SIMPLY
AREN'T HIRING.
MANY RETAIL JOBS ARE MOVING BEHIND THE
SCENES.
>> THOSE JOBS ARE JUST SHIFTING TO THE BACK.
ITS JUST IN THE
WAREHOUSING. >> Reporter: A NEW
FORECAST SHOWS TEENS
BE BETTER OFF LOOKING FOR WORK OUTSIDE OF
RETAIL.
>> THERE'S A LOT OF GROWING INDUSTRIES,
CONSTRUCTION, THE
MEDICAL INDUSTRY, HOSPITALS.
>> Reporter: ANOTHER
MAJOR FACTOR -- CHOICE.
MORE TEENS NOW USE
SUMMER FOR EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES TO BOOST
THEIR COLLEGE
APPLICATIONS. THE NUMBER OF TEENS AT
WORK HAS DROPPED 20
PERCENTAGE POINTS IN THE LAST 30 YEARS.
BUT JOB PLACEMENT
EXPERTS SAY SUMMER JOBS CAN BE AN
INVALUABLE EXPERIENCE
FOR TEENS NOT TO MENTION HELPFUL IN
AFFORDING THE RISING
COST OF COLLEGE.
>> MY EXPENSES SHOULD
BE MY EXPENSES AND NOT
MY PARENTS AT THIS AGE.
WHEN I GO BACK TO
SCHOOL, I WANT TO HAVE MONEY IN MY POCKET AS
WELL.
>> Reporter: TO GET IT SHE MIGHT .
Court is now in session for another viewer
requested episode of Innocent Until Proven Guilty! Todays case is one of the most requested
and I can fully understand why. During my research, I saw that this has a
Metacritic score of 8. To put that in perspective, Sonic 06 has
a 46. Sonic 06 is considered to be one of the
worst games ever made, yet IGN, EGM, and 1UP all deemed it to be better than this.
That is justI dont even know what to
say about that. Ive covered some stinkers before, but thisthis
is a whole new level of potential badness. Well, I love a good challenge, so its time
to bring Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing to trial! The infamous Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing
from GameMill Publishing was released on November 20, 2003. If the Wikipedia article is to be believed,
it has a very interesting story.
Big Rigs was apparently developed in the Ukraine
by the California based Stellar Stone to reduce costs. Whether thats true or not, I dont know,
but there are Ukrainian sounding names in the credits section, which lends credibility
to that idea. From what Ive experienced, I can definitely
believe that it was produced by a small crew on a shoe string budget, sincewelltheres
not much to it. The title screen shows that there are only
two main modes: Custom Race and Random Race.
Random Race is self-explanatory in that the
course and vehicle are pre-selected, whereas Custom leaves the selection up to the player. There are four trucks at our disposal, with
such monikers as Thunder and Thunderbull. How creative. The semis can be driven over fiveermake
that four courses, including Devil Passage and Devil Passage 2.
Remember what I said about the trucks? That goes double for the courses. Anyway, with the race created, lets hit
the road and satisfy our need for speed. Here we go! Oh, okaythis is certainly somethingI
dont know what that something is, but it exists and Im playing it. First of all, theres no music, which is
not uncommon for the genre.
Spirit of Speed 1937 also lacked any music
except a menu song. However, Spirit of Speed at least had engine
roars, this has nothing. Its entirely devoid of audio in spite of
Alex Burton receiving a credit for it. My brainit hurtsmust move on.
As far as the visuals go, its a deceptive
mess. Big Rigs is adequate upon initial inspections,
but once we spend more time with it, the glaring issues rear their ugly head. I mean, just look at this. Look at it! Its ridiculous, but also kind of funny.
Still, I feel bad for anyone that spent hard
earned money on this. The presentation is nightmare inducing, but
the controls are fairly average. The vehicle is maneuvered via the arrow keys:
Up accelerates and goes forward, Down or the space key reverse and brake, and Left and
Right go in those respective directions. Finally, C changes the camera angle, which
is completely useless, so dont even bother with it.
The objective of the game is to win the race,
if you can call it that. There is one rival semi, but it never leaves
the starting line, so the competition is non-existent. This is in stark contrast to the back of the
boxs claim that were running away from the law and hauling drugs or other illegal
contents. As should have been obvious long before now,
none of this is in Big Rigs, so this is false advertising at its finest.
In reality, we move forward through checkpoints
until we get to the goal and were rewarded with a trophy, which is accompanied with the
iconic text Youre Winner. That isamazing and I love it so much. After winning the trophy, we go back to the
title screen and try out a different course. If itll let you, that is, because it will
occasionally bug out and announce that were the winner from the start.
During my travels into the void, I noticed
an abandoned helicopter, which I found to be quite fascinating. I started to ponder about why it was there
and I devised the theory that Big Rigs is set in a post-apocalyptic future with our
trucker being the sole remaining occupant. That would explain why the rival remains idlethere
arent any humans left to compete against. Clearly this wasnt Stellar Stones intentions,
but when its examined in that context, it makes it way creepier and cool.
Speaking of cool, I saved the best part for
lastthe reverse speed glitch. Holding the Up arrow and progressing as normal
maxes out around 80mph, but holding Down basically breaks the space time continuum. The vehicle can somehow withstand the force
of several billion miles per hour, jerking about like a ragdoll in the process, yet it
can also stop at the drop of a hat as if nothing had happened. There is a limit, though, and it occurs around
the 50 minute mark.
If its pushed to that point, the semi will
implode, the meter will bust, and well be given the Youre Winner trophy. Its insanity and is proof that Stellar
Stone didnt quality test before shipping their product. Regardless, I cant help but find this to
be amusing. All things considered, its barely a game
and is a rip-off at any cost over $10, but that right therethats gold.
SoBig Rigsthat exists and I honestly
cant comprehend how that is. Nearly every other publisher would have cancelled
or retooled a project such as this, but apparently Stellar Stones work met the quality standards. Its buggy, its unfinished and it has
many traits that make it worthy of its reputation, but is it without redemption? Lets find out in the breakdown! I really dont have to say anything here. Big Rigs is guilty.
You know it. I know it. I thought Spirit of Speed was bad, but this
makes it look like Daytona USA. At least the LJN Dreamcast oddity has the
appearance of being decent.
This, on the other hand, is broken and riddled
with design flaws. Hell, theres a course that is unplayable
and crashes as soon as its chosen. Ill close by repeating what I said at the
beginning: it has a Metacritic score of 8 and Sonic 06 has a 46. That speaks volumes.
I rest my case. I cant deny that this is buggy and unfinished. Thats true, but that doesnt mean its
not fun. There is some enjoyment to be had from this,
especially when keeping my theory in mind while doing so.
Plowing unphased through buildings and obstacles
and reversing into oblivion is hilarious, but the novelty does wear thin quickly. Is Big Rigs good? Far from it, but is it as horrible as its
claimed to be? Sort of, but it does have some entertainment
value. There are definitely worse things to waste
a few minutes on. Plus, it provides a nice self-confidence boost.
I am winner! Thanks, Big Rigs! In the case of Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing,
I rule that the verdict isGuilty! Im sure Ill get comments saying this
was predictable, but there was no other option than guilty. This is barely a game and as much as I get
a kick out of the reverse speed glitch, its a design flaw that shouldnt have seen the
light of day. If this was an unreleased prototype, that
would be excusable, but Big Rigs hit store shelves at retail price and thats almost
criminal to imagine. If you want to try it, do what I did and download
it online for free.
I had no luck finding a cheap copy for sale,
so that is the only reasonable option. Anyway, thats a wrap on this highly anticipated
IUPG episode. Come back next week for the return of the
LJN Defender, but until then, and until the next case, court is now adjourned!.
