Speed Thrills With Childhood Icons

By AARON CURTISS

Nov. 4, 1999 12 AM PT

I got my first Hot Wheels set for my third birthday. I don’t actually remember receiving it, but black-and-white pictures in our family album provide the evidence. One shot shows me in pajamas unwrapping the present, the recognizable Hot Wheels logo peeking out from behind the paper. The next five or six shots show my uncles setting up the racetrack and then apparently testing it repeatedly to make sure it worked properly.

If I’m in the frame at all, I’m using a length of plastic track as a sword.

The scenario recorded by the camera matches those I remember from later in life. I got a lot of Hot Wheels as a kid--mostly from the same uncles who spent hours on birthdays and Christmas mornings “assembling” and “testing” the tracks they had just given me.

Most men my age have similar stories, and the lucky ones can recall instances in which they actually got to play with their Hot Wheels.

Today, many technologically savvy kids don’t seem as impressed by toys without an electronic gimmick.

So, like other childhood icons, Hot Wheels has migrated to computers and video game consoles. Mattel Media’s “Hot Wheels Stunt Track Driver” and “Hot Wheels Crash” put new spins on old modes of play. Electronic Arts’ “Hot Wheels Turbo Racing” plops players behind the wheel of some of the hottest cars that never existed.

‘Hot Wheels Stunt Track Driver’

The game that most closely matches the way most kids play with Hot Wheels is “Stunt Track Driver,” a simple computerized rendition that sends cars screaming down tracks spread throughout a house.

Courses begin with a child’s fingers setting down a car. From there, gravity takes over and players navigate twists and turns and corkscrews as they dodge obstacles such as toys and a preening cat.

The tracks zoom through household settings, making it easy to imagine being half an inch tall and behind the wheel of a car cooler than most of us will ever own. “Stunt Track Driver” enables guys whose wives won’t let them paint flames on the side of the Honda to regress back to the days when they still thought girls were gross.

Simple as it may be, “Stunt Track Driver” never gets boring. Because players race against the clock, it can take several attempts to finish a track and move on to the next one. And then there are the stunts. Like the “Dukes of Hazzard,” most of these cars spend very little time with their wheels on the ground. Jumps offer the opportunity to spin the car around and collect extra points.

Yippee!

“Hot Wheels Stunt Track Driver” requires a Pentium 90 with at least 16 megabytes of RAM and 40 mb of available hard-drive space.

‘Hot Wheels Crash’

Being the sort of children we were, my brother and I quickly tired of simply sending our Hot Wheels zipping down orange plastic tracks. So we invented what we called the “CHiPs” crash, named after the popular--at least in our house--television show of the 1970s. The highlight of most broadcasts was a cataclysmic chain-reaction crash.

Clearly, my brother and I were not the only kids to do this because “Hot Wheels Crash” takes the concept to noisy new levels. This is a game designed for little kids--whether they’re 5 or 35--who think it’s neat to watch stuff explode.

Players assume the role of a movie stunt driver hired to pull off ever more difficult car crashes. These are “CHiPs” crashes taken to the extreme. It’s not enough, for instance, to smash a car into a wall--although that’s cool too.

No, “Crash” expects drivers to take out everything in sight--cop cars, gas stations, construction cranes, supertankers and Stealth fighters. And because this is a video game, players get as many takes as they need. There’s no producer watching the bottom line.

As simple as all this sounds, “Crash” is not a mindless smash fest. Players decide where to place their cars and how to angle them into a scene to achieve the maximum destruction. It quickly gets tricky.

“Hot Wheels Crash” requires a Pentium 166 with 32 mb of RAM and 40 mb of free hard-drive space.

‘Hot Wheels Turbo Racing’

The only thing that distinguishes “Turbo Racing” from any other console racer is the fact that its tracks twist in impossible ways. Otherwise, this is a pretty standard, highly competent racer that zips nicely along.

The tracks themselves are set in real-world environments. It would have been nice to see some garages or living rooms, but these loopy lanes traverse deserts and ice fields on courses that often look nothing like Hot Wheels tracks.

Nice touches include the ability to smash opponents or collect points with stunts, but these could have been present in a game without the Hot Wheels name.

‘Lego Racers’

Like Mattel, Lego began migrating its toys onto CD-ROM in a bid to stay relevant to kids who are spending more and more time in front of television screens and computer monitors. Although the company has had a few missteps, its latest generation of software demonstrates that Lego understands what separates it from other toys.

Unlike some other games from Lego Media, “Lego Racers” allows players to build. Sure, it’s relatively limited, but the ability to build cars and then race them on some charming courses combines the best of traditional Lego with the new possibilities of electronic entertainment.

Players assemble their drivers and then put together cars with an interface that takes some getting used to. Once understood, the building interface moves smoothly and lets players assemble cars limited only by imagination.

Players can pit their creations against computerized drivers on courses that wind through themed environments--from Egyptian tombs and pirate islands to medieval castles and futuristic spaceports. Players face challenges from computer opponents, who shake up the ride with such tricks as oil slicks and grappling hooks.

The whole thing is a hoot.

“Lego Racers” on the PC requires a Pentium 166 with 32 mb of RAM, 210 mb of available hard-drive space and a graphics accelerator.

To comment on a column or to suggest games for review, send e-mail to aaron.curtiss@latimes.com.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Essentials

Hot Wheels Stunt Track Driver

* Platform: Game Boy Color/PC

* Publisher: Mattel Media

* ESRB* rating: Everyone

* Price: $29.99/$39.99

* Bottom line: Yippee

Hot Wheels Crash