The Classic PC Gaming Era (1977-1989) - Pitstop II
The sequel to Epyx's Pitstop is a really smooth Formula One racing game in the style of Pole Position, but with splitscreen play and light simulation elements.
RELEASE DATE: 1984
DEVELOPER / PUBLISHER: Epyx
PLAYABILITY TODAY: Fairly playable
BEST VERSIONS: Commodore 64
Epyx’s Pitstop debuted on the Atari 400/800, Commodore 64 and ColecoVision in late 1983 and was one of the first racing games designed specifically for the PC that came anywhere close to delivering the quality of experience arcade racers were able to provide. The game uses a tilted overhead perspective to make you feel like the scrolling racetrack is three-dimensional, but outside the pit area (where you get a very nice graphic as the pit crew repairs your Formula One race car), the cars look flat and the graphics don’t really sell the idea that you’re racing in different locales. Aside from the gimmicky pitstop mechanic, the game’s not terribly memorable, despite being popular in its time and well-remembered today.
The sequel, on the other hand, is often regarded as one of the classic racers of the early 1980s, and while it was also quite popular, I’m including it here simply because so few gamers seem to be familiar with it now. Pitstop II debuted in 1984 and not only delivered a buttery smooth racing experience for the Commodore 64 that was superior to any of the home ports of Namco’s Pole Position (Pitstop II’s clear inspiration) but it did so using a splitscreen approach to make this a game that absolutely begged for two players to race head-to-head. Stopping in the pit to refuel and pick up new tires looks great, and the only real complaint to be made is that the game’s sound quality doesn’t match the graphical presentation.
The mechanics of Pitstop II are very simple – you drive down a scrolling track and try to carefully manage your fuel and your tires to ensure that you don’t conk out or have a blowout that will set you behind. If you sense your car needs a tune-up, you pull into the pit and sacrifice a little bit of time in order to get your car back up to speed. And if you want to ensure other racers have to make similar sacrifices so you can get ahead, you can ram into them and try to damage their tires to cause an eventual blowout. There are six total tracks to play and multiple modes of difficulty, making Pitstop II both accessible to newcomers and able to be challenging to those who have taken the time to learn the courses.
While Pitstop II is best enjoyed as a multiplayer game, it can also be played single player; the computer will simply control the car in the lower of the two screens. Unfortunately, the AI is pretty dumb and it’s relatively easy to beat the computer consistently once you master the game’s controls, mechanics and maps. Against a human player, however, there’s a much tighter challenge, particularly if the other player is driving aggressively with the intention of getting you to make an extra pitstop so they can race ahead.
I prefer playing Pitstop II on the Commodore 64, but it was ported to the Apple II, TRS-80 CoCo and Atari 400/800 fairly well in 1985. There’s a PC booter version as well that looks awful due to only supporting CGA graphics. Europeans also got a Commodore 64 re-release on the Wii’s virtual console, which just goes to show what a great reputation the game has built up in the UK and Europe. Modern players can also try it out on Antstream Arcade.
As Our Series Continues…
In the coming weeks, we’ll talk about racing games, sports games, fighters and brawlers, pinball and paddle games, gameroom games, puzzle games, unusual games and so much more.
And while you’ll definitely see some titles from prominent North American publishers like Sierra On-Line, Infocom, Activision, Electronic Arts, Brøderbund, SSI, MicroProse, Lucasfilm Games, Epyx and Sir-Tech in the mix, you’ll also see references to games from the United Kingdom, Australia, France, Spain and Japan.
If you’ve missed the earlier entries in the series, which cover ASCII games, adventure games, wargames, strategy games and role-playing games, you can find the entire archive at https://greatestgames.substack.com.
Anything I don’t share here will be in my upcoming book, tentatively titled The Greatest Games You (Probably) Never Played Vol. 1. Subscribe to this newsletter so you won’t miss it!