By virtue of where her emphasis has been I think it would be fair to say Angi specializes in rumbles. I don’t review rumbles, but just so everyone’s clear on this, girlfriend’s meteoric rise as one of the top track makers out here has absolutely nothing to do with luck. She’s only authored one other racetrack – a very tightly wound circuit called “Ezy 8s” which I thought was very good, but she was simply getting her feet wet.
She’s spread her wings a little on this one and has put together a rather intense, close-quarters, circuit aptly named, “Fireworks”. You know, maybe it’s just me, but it seems that ladies/girls/females have this thing about the color green. Maybe in Angi’s case the color selection was purely coincidental, but I wouldn’t be surprised in the least if it was intentional. I’m almost positive I have green in every room in my house…and it’s a big house, so needless to say when I first opened this baby up and was about to mash the gas, the color hit me in the face like a ton of bricks. I nearly lost consciousness, but regained my senses and composure enough to successfully complete several enjoyable laps.
Hehe—actually I have no qualms whatsoever with the chosen color; I just wanted to give Angi a hard time about it. : ) As for her latest release, “Fireworks” I’ve yet to actually “field test” it in a race, but I’ve run several laps on it getting a feel for it’s racing characteristics. It’s certainly not the kind of track where you put 5 or 6 racers on it and drop the flag, but for 2 or 3 it would prove to be extremely entertaining. It’s got a little bit of MX flavor to it, which I thought was a nice touch on her part…and she definitely made sure it was a challenge! She’s implemented a few nice little half-banked turns, to include a rather precarious 360-degree number toward the middle of the run that requires a measured approach when navigating thru it. I also like how she hooked up the initial straight up to thru cp 1; pretty unique approach, with just a hint of risk if you don’t pay attention to your line. Oh yeah, this is definitely a pro-level track whereby the racer is required to have a “working knowledge” about certain areas in order to keep from crashing, flying, spinning or just…not doing real well.
The tracks décor consist of models made by Angi, save for the flagpoles and rockets, I believe. It’s not densely populated with ssssssstuff, but in this humble person’s opinion I thought she could’ve mixed up the type of trees that inhabit the track. What she has done certainly doesn’t detract from it by any means, and in fact, it looks pretty nice. I was merely stating an opinion, and we all know about opinions. If I have to say anything objectionable about this track from a racer’s point of few, she set the cp’s so that if any part of your truck passes thru the transparent cp pole, it registers…except for cp 2, which requires that more of your truck pass thru it in order to register. Additionally, I feel that cp’s 3 & 4 should’ve been repositioned so that the driver is forced to execute the semi-figure 8. Such as they are all that’s required is that the driver weave thru them, short-circuiting the potential for a side-by-side dual by racers trying to negotiate a very exciting part of the track in an effort to get to and thru cp 5. Not a tragedy, mind you…just something to be aware of for future reference if you so desire.
All in all I’m very impressed by Angi’s work. For someone who’s not a racer, she put together a very challenging and exciting track. Tough to pass on, but that’s part of the allure; you have to employ patience and think you’re way thru this one because it’s not all about speed. I’ve just fired up the Copey Rating rig and dropped in .35¢ (it used to be a quarter – crooks), which is required for it to kick out a number. And it looks like this one ends up getting a…………………”9” out of a possible 10 points!! Again, nothing to overwhelm the senses with regard to cosmetics, however she gets a “hats off” from me for venturing into the bin making field and doing a bang-up job! There were a couple of checkpoints that could’ve been placed a little better (3 & 4), but her focus was to negate shortcuts, which she successfully managed to do. Excellent work on your part, Angi - I’m very much impressed!!!
[This message has been edited by SLO_COPE (edited 15-02-2002).]
