Maximum Speed - Arcade Racing Game (Sammy 2003)

Maximum Speed was an arcade racing game developed by Sammy and launched on their Atomiswave arcade hardware in 2003.
The game featured 6 tracks and 3 styles of racing to choose from, including stock car (210 MPH Max), truck (170 MPH Max), and open-wheel indy car racing (250 MPH Max).
The 6 tracks included are the Liberty Hall Raceway, Breeze Hill Raceway, Wizard Grove Raceway, Mirage Stadium, Totempoint Speedway, and the Rodeo Peak Speedway. The hardest track in the game is the Wizard Grove, given its extremely tight turns that often send you slamming into the wall, and forcing you to slow down in order to make the turns.
The whole premise of the game is centered around drifting to overtake your rivals and win the race.
Vehicles in the game are really aggressive at times, with opponents often ramming into you in a sort of a bumper car like scenario. Of course, you can also ram your opponents off the track as well. Surprisingly, the game seems to give the player the upper hand when it comes to ramming your opponents. You're far less likely to wipe out when being rammed, while your opponents are far more likely to lose control when you ram them.
The game does allow you to choose between both automatic and manual transmissions.
The trick to winning the race in this game is to avoid hitting anything that can slow you down, such as scrubbing against walls and slamming into other vehicles.
Something to note here is that winning the race doesn't advance the player in any way. In fact, the game ends with the credits rolling after each race, regardless of where you placed.
The game feels very reminiscent of Sega's classic Daytona USA series; though Maximum Speed felt like a far less challenging racer as compared to the Daytona series. With the Daytona games you had a lot more push and pull from traction on the ground, and of course it was a lot easier to wipe out during the race.
That's not to say that Maximum Speed will simply let you have spot number one without a fight, but its certainly a lot more achievable.
Maximum Speed was a solid racing game with impeccable graphics for the era, and exhilarating game play to boot. The handling of vehicles was exceptional as compared to other classic racing games from the era.
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