In order to promote Metropolis Street Racer, Sega Europe held a couple of competitions where you could win an actual Vauxhall VX220 (or Opel Speedster if you lived on the continent). This first competition is the most well known: Win Your Dream Car On Dreamarena!
Promotional leaflet found inside early PAL versions of MSR.
Article from Paragon Publishing Unofficial Dreamcast Magazine (UK) and archived press release from Sega Europe.
This competition was basically a quiz where you answered a series of multi-choice questions in strict time limits. Answer them correctly and you gained 'kilometers; you got even more kilometers if you answered correctly and quickly. There was also an 'all or nothing' option where you could stake your existing kilometers to gain even more. This was very high risk but if you wanted to win, you had to gamble. Here is the winner's story from the UK Official Dreamcast Magazine (issue 19 / May 2001):
I guess the Dreamarena phone charges would have been enough to cover the cost of this competition so that's probably why they did it. Personally I think a competition where you win a car by actually playing MSR would have been more appropriate. And that's exactly what they did in France with the Micromania/Jeux Video Kudos Challenge.....
Micromania is a French game store and Jeux Video is a French gaming site. Basically you had to race across set courses and rack up as many kudos as possible without using a joker. Here are full rules if you are interested, however there was a change made at the finals.
Here are the results:
PRELIMINARY SELECTION: 08/01/2001 - 11/02/2001
Course: Street Race - Chapter 18 - Race 7 (Old Palace Yard North).
Not sure what the best scores were but kudos scores of 4000+ were recorded. Here are the results from the Toulouse branch (taken from French player PXD's website that's no longer online or archived).
1st) Player: PXD Kudos: 4214.20 Play date: Saturday 10 Feb 2001
Prize: Dreamcast T-shirt and 2nd round qualification.
2nd) Player: CODONOPSYS Kudos: 3782.40 (-431.8) Play date: Sometime in Feb 2001
Eliminated from competition.
SELECTION FOR THE FINAL: 24/02/2001 (1400 - 1600 pm)
Course: Street Race - Chapter 19 - Race 7 (Parliament Street South II). The four best scores of these selections taking place in each Micromania will qualify for the Grand National Final.
Top Score: 9458.40 Kudos!
Player: Oxxxxxxx Kudos: 9458.40 Qualified for Final
Player: Fxxxxxxx Kudos: 9458.40 Qualified for Final
Player: Axxxxxxx Kudos: 9458.40 Qualified for Final
Player: Cxxxxxxx Kudos: 9286.20 (-172.2) Qualified for Final
Player: PXD Kudos: 4141.00 (-5317.4) Eliminated from competition
Interesting that 3 players managed to get the same exact Kudos scores. Perhaps the game maxes out at that level? Considering the Kudos system is riddled with bugs, I'm wondering how these guys must have played? I imagine a lot of sideways skidding and spinning in circles! However with scores of 9000+ Kudos on a single course and with no joker allowed, that's definitely an achievement!
GRAND NATIONAL FINAL: 17/03/2001
Course A: Street Race - Chapter 20 - Race 7 - Jefferson West IV - Target position 4
Course B: Street Race - Chapter 20 - Race 8 - Nishi Shinjuku Restaurant - Target position 4
2023 update: I recently checked the May/June 2001 edition of the French Official Dreamcast Magazine (page 20) and saw their report on this competition. It seems you had to get the best overall time on on the above courses using the Vauxhall VX220/Opel Speedster. It's likely this change took place due to the Kudos bugs in early PAL versions (too many Kudos being awarded). Here are the winning times.
Course A Best Time: 7'15.764
Course B Best Time: 8'04.111
The Grand National Final took place at the Auto Passion Cafe in Paris. Only 3 of the 4 best Kudos scorers (9458.40) competed. The 2 runners up received a Dreamcast console and 5 games (wouldn't they have Dreamcasts already?!). Here is a rough translation of the aforementioned report:
A contest was organized by Sega France with a chain of stores [Micromania] around the very good game Metropolis Street Racer on Dreamcast. During the first elimination phases, the objective was to achieve the highest number of Kudos on a circuit of the game: Street Race - Chapter 18 - Race 7 (Old Palace Yard North). To do this, you had to own a Dreamcast (with MSR), make a record by saving it to the VM (memory card) and then take it to one of the stores covering the operation. In a second round of eliminations, the top two players from each store went head-to-head. At the end of these confrontations, the 4 best scores (largest number of Kudos), all stores combined, were selected for the final taking place on Saturday March 17 [2001] in Paris.
2:30pm: start of the final. First observation, one of the 4 finalists is missing, too bad... especially when we know that the winner receives as a reward an Opel Speedster worth 210,000 F, the other two winners win a steering wheel + 5 games. Then, completely confused, the three finalists were surprised to find that this last phase of the championship takes place, not on the greatest number of Kudos, but indeed on the best times. Also, they weren't thinking of driving the Opel Speedster (in the MSR game) in the final. This took place on two circuits, the winner being the one who achieves the best time in the aggregate of the two races. The three competitors "literally" ate the cornering walls.
Are they finalists or not? Jokes aside, stress can be understood. Also MSR is not an easy game to master, but still. According to the winner, it was a good technique (hitting the walls to waste less time, it's better than applying the brakes...). He even advises all players wanting to improve their records in their favorite games (for their pleasure or for a contest) to consult lots of magazines, to surf the net via the Dream Arena (tips, discussion forum, etc.) and also to find out as much as possible from other players to have details on game techniques, car settings, where to brake or not. What a real winner!
and here is the lucky winner of the Opel Speedster! Wonder if they still have the car though?
Sadly as I've not been able to trace the winners, their faces/names will have to remain blanked out.
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