Extending the demo: Test Drive 5 (PlayStation)

Featuring the "Oh Arse" menu

In this edition:

• There’s a preview of Test Drive 5 on the Official PlayStation Magazine Demo Disc #13 that allows you to race on a single track with one of two cars.

• Although they’re not normally playable, the CD has files for two more tracks and 17 more cars. I’ve made a patch that lifts the demo restrictions, enabling access to the extra cars and tracks.

• The patch also activates all of the menu screens, including one with special debug functions (it’s labeled “Oh Arse”). Since the demo predates the retail version of the game by two months, there are several interesting unfinished elements.

Get the patch from GitHub. Details are below…

---

Getting access

The demo’s main menu normally allows you to select either Quick Race or Options. Everything else is greyed out, and can’t be selected:

The demo’s main menu

The other items are restricted by the function at 800a1dac, which handles input on the menu screens. It calls a helper (at 80055220) with two arguments:

• The current cursor index.

• The maximum menu index.

The main menu should have six items, but the helper is called with a second argument of 2. This patch restores access to the other items:

800a1ff4 li a1,0x6  # Set the second argument to 6

Not all of them are implemented, however: Two Player Race and Credits don’t do anything if you choose them.

Normally the demo forces you onto the Moscow track, but once you have access to the Full Race screen, you can choose where to race. The demo has files for Blue Ridge, Moscow, and Moscow Night. However, it will show you the entire list of tracks and crash if you choose one that isn’t implemented.

These patches put the three working tracks at the front of the list of tracks:

800a3f4c 11  # Move Blue Ridge into the first position
800a3f50 17  # Move Moscow into the second position
800a3f54 18  # Move Moscow Night into the third position

And this patch cuts the list off at three:

800a154c slti v0,a0,0x03  # Check for 3 items instead of 19

The Track Select screen

After selecting a track, you pick a car to race with. Normally the demo only allows access to the 1998 Dodge Viper and the 1968 1/2 Ford Mustang GT 428CJ. It does this by artificially cutting off the car list after 2 items. But we can nullify that operation with this patch:

800a6394 nop  # Don't overwrite the car list length

Now we can choose from 19 different cars:

Some of the restricted cars don’t have stats listed yet

The demo build has a hidden screen that’s not in the final version. Its label is Oh Arse, and it has a list of functions that can be toggled on and off:

The list of functions that can be enabled and disabled

This patch maps it to the Credits menu item:

800a3670 b4  # Move the Credits target to "Oh Arse!"

Each of the functions controls some aspect of the racing behavior. For example, turning off Func 7 makes the camera stop tracking your car. Turning off Func 8 removes some of the HUD elements. And turning off Func 13 makes your car disappear:

Racing with an invisible car

---

Build differences

Most of the screens in this demo build look at least somewhat different from their corresponding screens in the final version.

Several of the cars have slightly different names in the demo build. For example, Police TVR Cerbera is called Da Pigs:

Left: The prototype demo. Right: The final game.

And one of the bonus cars, Chris’s Beast, is called CK’s Beast. This presumably refers to programmer Chris Kirby:

Left: The prototype demo. Right: The final game.

The demo version doesn’t allow you to adjust car stats:

The stat adjustment screen in the final game

The list of racing cups that you can enter is the same, but they’re presented in a different order in the demo build:

Left: The prototype demo. Right: The final game.

The high score screen is much more rudimentary looking in the demo build:

Left: The prototype demo. Right: The final game.

Leave a comment if you see anything else that’s notable.

---

Outro

I reached out to the aforementioned Chris Kirby and asked if he remembered putting in the Oh Arse menu. He said:

Sounds like something i would have added! :-)

One last note about Test Drive 5: There is a very similar preview of the game on PlayStation Underground Jampack demo disc. It’s not byte-for-byte identical to the version described above, but there’s not much that’s different. Both preview compilations were built in July of 1998, so it’s no surprise that they’re close cousins.

For more articles on exploring prototype builds of games on demo discs, see my archive. I’ll be back with more soon!

Logo by Ashlyn Anstee