Swedish Touring Car Championship (computer game)

The PC game Swedish Touring Car Championship ( STCC ) by Digital Illusions CE is a racing simulation based on the Swedish touring car racing series of the same name from the 1999 and 2000 seasons.

Game description

The representation of the cars and routes, as well as the weather effects, are very detailed and graphically demanding for the conditions at the time. The level of realism of the driving physics is also set very high. The controls require a lot of practice, as the cars have a strong tendency to oversteer when accelerating out of curves and can very quickly lock the front wheels of front-wheel drive vehicles when braking. The different driving characteristics of the various vehicles are also remarkable. The rear-wheel drive vehicles (BMW) and the all-wheel drive vehicles (Audi) behave noticeably differently even for beginners than the other vehicles with front-wheel drive. All vehicles also differ in their performance data. Attention was even paid to the different vehicle weights of the vehicles in the real racing series. The front-wheel drive vehicles all weigh 1055 kg, the rear-wheel drive vehicles 1080 kg and the all-wheel drive vehicles 1120 kg. The game also offers the option of setting up a setup for your vehicle , and it can also be played from a cockpit perspective. Another special feature of the game are the mostly very unknown racetracks from Scandinavia, which are not accessible in almost any other racing game, and a variety of the super touring cars that were still common at the time . However, the AI opponents show some weaknesses in that they stubbornly follow their ideal line and sometimes drive inappropriately fast or sometimes much too slowly, which does not create a lively racing atmosphere.

Swedish Touring Car Championship 2

On April 1, 2001, a second part of the series was released based on data from the 2000 season. In addition to graphic improvements, the game also contains a small number of other vehicles and racetracks. Another new addition was a made-up Camaro challenge. However, nothing changed about the weak AI. From PC Games the game was rated with 74%.

STCC 2 was later sold as a touring car simulator by media Verlagsgesellschaft mbH .

reception

The Swedish Touring Car Championship was a flop mainly because of the immature AI . It could not prevail against TOCA Touring Cars , which thanks to higher quality AI was able to convey excellent racing action for the conditions at the time. As a result, the games in the series are now largely unknown. Due to the detailed graphics, the race tracks are still converted by so-called modders for other current racing simulations such as rFactor or GTR 2 .

List of vehicles

Audi A4
BMW 320i
Opel Vectra B.
Ford Mondeo
Alfa Romeo 156
Nissan Primera , instead in STCC 2 : Nissan Primera
Honda Accord , additionally in STCC 2 : Honda Accord
Volvo S40
Chrysler Stratus
Peugeot 406

List of racetracks

Mantorp Park (short version, long version)
Arctic Circle Raceway
Scandinavian Raceway
Karlskoga Motor Stadium
Falkenberg's Motorbana
Ring Knutstorp

Additionally in STCC 2 :

Kinnekulle ring

Web links

Game test
Game description and pictures (Swedish)

Individual evidence

↑ Down-to-earth racing game with lots of driving fun , pcgames.de from June 3, 2001

[1] Down-to-earth racing game with lots of driving fun , pcgames.de from June 3, 2001