During the span of a year, I ran N3 offline, using a cheap 10 dollar game pad. I remember when I first installed it, I wanted to race Jeff Gordon’s car…it took me like 10 minutes to figure out how to change cars and I did it by accident LOL. N3 was great; I loved the game for its time. I eventually bought the 3D Acceleration Expansion Pack for the trucks, usually just running the Road Courses that came with it.
Well, then came NASCAR Racing 4 in February 2001. Of course after the experience I had with N3, I looked forward to holding this new release by Papyrus in my hands. I pre-ordered it on ebgames.com and received it on the 8th of February. When I got home, it didn’t take long to see that my PC was struggling real badly with the game. It offered full 3d graphics, all 2001 Teams and Sponsors, and 42 Player online support, via Sierra Servers/IP address.
At the time I only had 56k internet so online racing was limited. I tried to enter my first online race ever in April 2001, and mainly watched some races until I got Cable internet that month. Eeeeeeee Eeeeeeeee Eeeeeeeee Online!!! Wow, I was hooked and to this day still am, there is nothing like racing real people online because the thrill to beat someone on the track just couldn’t be beat.
Simulation or Arcade? Hmmmm. At the time I still had the game pad, so sim mode wasn’t an option…yet. I ran with some guys on arcade servers, most notable JJK (jjkusaf ), and Preacher’s Lane. I spent a lot of time with these guys at the time, it wasn’t until I forked over the money to buy a Logitech Wingman Formula Force GP that I even tried sim mode. SIMULATION mode! Ohhh so much better it be. And this brings me to the Papyrus NASCAR Racing 4 Discussion Board.
This was a fairly good time for me; I had also upgraded my PC considerably. I went from my old Compaq to a AMD 1.2 GHz, 256 MB SDRAM, 20 GB HD (same), 17 inch monitor (same) new Motherboard and a GF2 MX 32 (all I could afford). You may say, this isn’t that big of a leap, but ask someone who has a 533 MHz PC with onboard graphics and you’ll see why I was happy. All this combined with Cable internet and a new wheel makes for a good racing experience.
Now back to the N4 Discussion board, this was a place where people who also enjoyed n4 could talk about current events and NASCAR races. Debate all kinds of useless crap and have a good time. It’s also where ‘Board Racing’ started out towards the end of N4. Also during this time I went to a Microsoft Non FF wheel because my other Logitech was junk. During the time away from the board I’d race with the folks at Hyper Racing.
Hyper Racing was owned and operated by Brian Koszyk. He ran the Hyper Racing league and paid for the servers we used. Me and fellow Board Member JP Racer would run some races and usually do well with the killer setups he created. These setups ended up causing conflict between me, JP, and the other hyper members, there was some that thought we were cheating because we could pass up high, easy!…so we moved on.
NASCAR Racing 2002 Season wasn’t just a patch to N4, it was a lot better to me. I went back and tried N4 after having this game for awhile, and what a big difference! As Board Racing picked up, so did my interest to board race. I met a lot more racers and we became online ‘friends’ so to speak. A few of the longtime running guys were, B24S, g-force24, Bassman, JP Racer, Brandynr, Smyers, and Minted Llama to name a few.(I know there is a lot more) A lot of guys have come and gone but these top few still race.
Minted Llama got me into a league called NoBullSimRacing come spring, and I still run this league to this day. The league administrators have done a great job and I can’t thank them enough. Thanks Goes to NBSR (TDL), pops2842, pynk, spaceshot041, AU98, and DRS66 for all their help in making NBSR what it is today. Minted Llama won the Busch series championship the first season I ran in. I came in 3rd.
Although N4 ran decent on my GF2 MX 32 MB, it was time for a big upgrade; in May again I went to the new GeForce4 Ti4400 128 MB Video Card. This produced more FPS and better AA and FSAA, but still things weren’t THAT great. In September, I went and got a Brand new Dell PC: P4 2.26 GHz, 1024 MB DDR 266 MHz, 120 GB HD, 17 inch monitor (new), CD-Ron and CD-RW.
Team SLM formed October 2002!!! Me and the Llama had worked together for a long time so joining seemed to be a logical decision. Also joining Team SLM were the Setup Guru JP Racer and Great Painter TeamMonteCarlo AKA TMC.
As board racing was slowly but surely dying, NASCAR Racing 2003 Season was nearing. Minted Llama was a beta tester for the new game, so he had been playing it for close to half a year more then we are. Fellow Co-Teammates BGI (Bass-G Inc) includes Bassman, g-force24, jooky80, smyers, foolinjected, govols, and rook. Our goal is simple, win. Bring down DNx!!
NASCAR Racing 2003 Season has arrived. It was released February 4th 2003. NR03 Brings vastly improved AI and the same great online experience we had in NR02, realistic damage and the most accurate physics model to date! Also on February 16th 2003 we have added our 5th and final driver to Team SLM: Adam Bluhm #56.
I am currently racing in NBSR, Hyper-Racing, and IROC 2003. I run Board Racing too. I drive the #072 Sunny Delight Chevy painted by TMC. I also enjoy Sim City 4 and Age of Empires 2 (Age of Mythology), Xbox, and DVD’s.
2/18/03
This Site Created 2/19/03 And is best viewed at 800x600 or while not reading anything on it. Please ask permission if you need to use or want to post anything on this site. - Minted Llama (Webmaster)
