Talk:Wipeout 2097

Would benefit from an over-all rewrite
• Much of this article's text reminds me of text found on the game sleeve notes: some of the text is a direct lift, I think. Copyright?

• The game description's grammatical tense changes from past at the beginning of the article to present toward the end - this needs harmonised for good editorial style.

• Text colour style is used to highlight colour words: this one not only contravenes good web accessibility principles but it's a bit pointless and where else on wikipedia is this done? "The colors represent the in-game colors of the items." But why?

• Lots of unsubstantiated 'facts' – e.g. "Spilskinanke... is an anagram of Snake Plissken (minus one "S" and switching an I for the E in "Plissken")". This really stretches the boundaries of credibility, nor is it backed up by source/quote. • Reference to the unlockable final Pirhana ship doesn't touch on the fact that the game goes so fast at this final level (on PS One anyway) that the extreme strobing effect (caused by the striped track graphics whizzing by) makes the game virtually unplayable. I don't have a source for that but clearly recall experiencing it playing the game myself in 1997/98 and noted similar reactions of others too.

• Other criticism below I agree with

Deeply Flawed Criticism Section
I don't wish to unilaterally change most of the Criticism section of this entry, however I feel I have to as the content currently there is seriously lacking. Point by point:

"The overt Red Bull advertising present throughout the game was poorly received by some."

I would like to add that the PC version of Wipeout 2097 lacked the Red Bull advertisements. I played it a lot back then, and don't recall seeing any.

By whom exactly? Without a source this kind of comment is unprovable.

"Players also disliked the fact that 2 player mode was only available through the use of the link cable system. The link cable system required 2 playstation consoles connected via the link cable, two television sets, two copies of the game. This was seen as highly impractical and/or expensive, especially when most racing games allowed for 2 player gaming simply by plugging in a second controller and splitting the screen in half."

I agree that this is worthy of criticism, however it must be noted that in the early era of the PlayStation, many of the biggest racing games offered no link-up option. The other big UK developed racing hit over Xmas 1996 was also from Psygnosis - Formula 1 - which had a similar two player requirement. From what I remember it was only the launch of the Nintendo 64 (in Europe about six months later in early 1997) which started to change the attitude of the Playstation developers - four player options in the likes of Mario Kart 64 made it much more necessary for the PlayStation versions to include one console multiplayer options. This was a general early PlayStation phenomenon, not just limited to Wipeout 2097.

"Poor support for the later analog controls was also a disappointment."

There is no way you can seriously blame Psygnosis for not implementing analogue controls for an analogue controller which hadn't been announced up to then. This comment simply has to go.

I'm going to make some serious additions to this piece and comments will be appreciated on my edits. Mikeserieys 06:58, 21 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Well I for one played XL with Pirahna on Phantom class, full acceleration, perfect lap every time, on any given track. I did not experience any visual artifacts and found it immensely playable. Child's play compared to HD's Phantom mode. Perhaps the original/PAL edition was different, but XL was A ok.


 * Also I don't know if there is a ton of documentation to back this up, but a lot of industry people consider this game to possibly be a rare perfect game (flawless) ...citing it as the most pure gaming experience ever, perhaps technically the best game ever in an abstract sense. The same people consider the follow up PS1 game a great disappointment, basically an example that the perfection of XL was pure coincidence and did not carry over into Wip3out. Kind of like the Star Wars prequels versus the originals. I think one major advantage this game has over the rest of the series is the up/down nose aiming axis really feels fully integrated into the game, where if you master it you really feel like you're surfing perfection. In the other games it feels like an afterthought that can shave a few seconds off your time at best. --67.54.192.39 (talk) 05:50, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

Add mention of The Designers Republic?
The Designers Republic was heavily involved in the design of the packaging, iconography (ships, weapons), and design of most of the visual aspects of the in game play (Fonts, course artwork, etc...). One of the first times a design house like that has been so involved in a video game. Their (Crazy Robot) icon is featured on almost every course and it can be seen on their web site http://www.thedesignersrepublic.com/. This game is mentioned on their Wiki page, but this game page does not mention their contributions. - 209.248.175.82 16:31, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

what's an 'x-bomb'?
In the weapons section, mines are mentioned to detonate "only explode upon contact with other craft, or when an X-bomb is detonated in the vicinity" - but the entire article fails to make any other mention of the mysterious 'x-bomb'. The only other 'bomb' weapon is the 'Thunder Bomb' - is that what this should refer to? That might be contradictory, considering both 'quake disruptors' and 'thunder bombs' are explicitly described as being capable of destroying mines... is there a distinction between mine destruction and detonation? I know this isn't a game manual, but it seems needless inconsistent... MattLohkamp 14:36, 21 December 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Matt.lohkamp (talk • contribs)

Various issues
The first paragraph stated: "It was originally released in 1996 for the PlayStation and PCs running MS-DOS, and in 1997 for the Sega Saturn. It was later ported to the Amiga in 1999 and Mac OS in 2002."

Wipeout 2097 was never available for DOS. As per the Psygnosis site as archived in June 1997, it is a Windows95/DirectX game.

Additionally, other sections of this page have queried the XL/2097 differentiation, this is made clear by the links on earlier versions of the Psygnosis site requiring the user to select XL for North America, and 2097 for anywhere else.

For expansion of the Development section, it may be useful to cite this Coderus document detailing the process of porting to the Mac - a process that apparently only took one week. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2406:E007:5A7A:1:D5F2:1A28:3BD9:E79D (talk) 11:56, 10 January 2015 (UTC)

Going gold
, FYI, going gold is when the game is finalized for release czar ⨹   15:29, 19 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Thanks czar, I knew that "going gold" was a term for the game being ready for a release, but I originally thought that it was used in a different context on that source. Strange because I still need to find sources for the original Wipeout awards! ☯ Jag  uar  ☯ 19:24, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

Set in 2,097?
Is it? If so, why?--62.242.41.180 (talk) 00:07, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Developer of Saturn port
This past January someone altered sourced material to say that Tantalus rather than Perfect Entertainment developed the Saturn version. I double-checked the source and there is indeed no mention of Tantalus; however, it refers to Perfect also having coded the Saturn version of Manx TT, which is well-established to have been contracted out to Tantalus by Perfect. So it makes sense to me that Perfect could have likewise contracted Wipeout 2097 out to Tantalus, and the source could be using "Perfect Entertainment" as a general term in reference to the various studios used by Perfect. That said, I haven't run across a source supporting this yet, so for now I'm removing the claim with regard to the Saturn version's developer. If anyone knows more, please post here (or better yet, add the correct developer to the article with reliable source attached).--Martin IIIa (talk) 20:21, 25 February 2020 (UTC)