Stunt Race FX isn’t the worst tech demo, but that isn’t a compliment

destructoid.com:

The Super FX chip was a handsome feather in Nintendo’s cap, even if they very rarely wore it out on the town. A graphics support unit, the Super FX chip was a co-processor that pushed the SNES’ graphic capabilities pretty far. Games like Star Fox and Super Mario World 2: Yoshi’s Island benefitted from the tech and were able to punch above their generational weight class.

Regardless, only Yoshi’s Island doesn’t look entirely antiquated by today’s standards. While 3D graphics were novel at the time, their mostly flat-shaded surfaces came at a tremendous price when it came to framerate. Because of their overall choppiness, games that were classics once can be difficult to play through a modern lens.

It’s debatable if Stunt Race FX was ever good. Reviews at the time were generally favorable, but any game with visual pop would normally be lavishly praised in contemporary reviews. Even discounting its arthritic bones, there was a lot left to be desired. However, when I first played it as a kid, it enthralled me, and I have a lot of extremely pleasant memories of playing it with my family.

Stunt Race FX was created by Nintendo EAD and Argonaut Software during their time tucked under the wing of the Japanese video game giant. It was released in 1994, which is important to keep in mind because that’s a few months after the seminal 3D racing game Ridge Racer was released. It’s roughly two years after Virtua Racing (and the same year as the Genesis version). It’s also almost directly alongside Daytona USA. I find this perspective to be rather important because it strips Stunt Race FX of any status of being unique as an early 3D racing game. It wasn’t. Maybe it’s more impressive than Super Mario Kart, and perhaps it’s impressive for