Race Track: Detroit street circuit, Michigan, USA
Locations theme
Includes the street and highway Detroit street circuit race track.
34
games
17platforms
S128 1990
SPC 1988
NES 1988-12-09
NES 1990-11
ST 1989
DOS 1988
C64 1988
ST 1988
SPC 1991
C64 1990
IIGS 1989
MSX2 1988
Designed to be the "Monaco of the USA", it included many sharp turns, elevation changes, and even a tunnel. Characterized by its narrow sections that routinely had most drivers contacting the walls. On its best event, only 3/4 of the divers finished the race. In all other races, half or more of the drivers damaged their cars and could not continue. Wrecked cars were often allowed to continue racing while dragging debris or having wind whipping parts barely attacked to their vehicles. Cars would continue to race without wings, noses or even tires after losing them. Even fire and light smoke was not an automatic black flag though the drivers were certainly notified at every post. Notably, the safety workers employed by the city and their vehicles were sometimes involved in crashes with race cars. It was common for workers to enter the course to assist cars in continuing or to remove cars and debris from the course without a course wide caution flag. This was not as insane as it sounds, the assistance was offered in the slow sections where most of the problems occurred and each corner was equipped with an independent caution light to warn drivers or a stop light to halt them. Basically their were 'yellow flag sections' while the rest of the track maintained full racing. Also the cars tended to stay in a close nit group leaving about a 45 seconds gap between the last and first cars when the track was perfectly safe for pedestrians. Only when the drivers ignored the cautions and sped through anyway did further incident result. Without these unique procedures, entire races would have had to been done under a full time caution since they averaged one crash per lap.
The first Race Track: Detroit street circuit, Michigan, USA video game was released in 1987.
Accolade, Electronic Arts and Martech published most of these games.