Wangan Midnight Maximum Tune Red Flash FAQ by AkioAsakura Contents i. COPYRIGHT INFORMATION ii. VERSION HISTORY 1. INTRODUCTION a. The game itself b. Time attack c. What are the red flashes for? d. Why should I bother trying to get them? 2. GENERAL TIPS a. Optimal Set-up b. Watch out for that... wall! c. The Need for Speed 3. COURSES a. C1 Inbound b. C1 Outbound c. Central Belt Highway Counterclockwise d. Central Belt Highway e. Metropolitan Highway 4. EXTRA STUFF a. The perils of being "Special" b. The Special Car Time Attack 5. CREDITS AND CONTACT ********************************* * * * i. COPYRIGHT INFORMATION * * * ********************************* This FAQ is copyright 2004 by Dexter Maallo. This is intended for personal use only, and publication of any kind without notification is strictly prohibited. This FAQ is hosted at www.gamefaqs.com. If you wish to use this FAQ on your website, please contact me first. Contact information is listed at the end of this FAQ. If you wish to quote from this, at least give me credit. Any translations are welcome, but you must let me know ahead of time and must not alter any meaning from the original text. All vehicles and characters are copyright of their respective owners. ********************************* * * * ii. VERSION HISTORY * * * ********************************* Version 1.0 12/15/04 -*yawns* I stayed up to 4 in the morning for this?!?! I must really be bored... ********************************* * * * 1. INTRODUCTION * * * ********************************* A. THE GAME ITSELF Welcome to AkioAsakura's Red Flash FAQ! This is an in-depth FAQ concerning the game WANGAN MIDNIGHT: MAXIMUM TUNE, one of the newest and hottest racing arcade games (at the time of this writing, anyway) right now. It uses the memory card system like Initial D, and it allows you to save your car into it. You can then play with that card over and over in order to tune it up as you go through story mode, race against other players, and do time attacks on each course. For this FAQ, this assumes that you already played out the game completely and are either battling or doing time attacks and want to get that custom title. If you're looking for FAQ's about the stats for each car, or how to beat that pesky Blinky and Pac Man at the last stage, check out the other FAQ's. Note that this FAQ does not give detailed descriptions about what lines you have to take throughout the course to get the best time, but only at certain points on the course to get that red flash. B. TIME ATTACK Time attack is one of the features of this game in which you race your car through one of 5 courses, one of which requires additional tokens to drive on (more on this later), and try to race through them as fast as you can. This is great practice if you want to get your lines right; and by lines, I mean the fastest path that your car should take through the course. Your top record is stored into the card and you can take note of its password to put into the ranking websites (http://www.namco.co.jp/aa/am/vg/wanganmaxi/ranking/ for Japanese, http://www.namco.co.jp/aa/english/wangan-mt/ranking for English,) and compare your times with that of the rest of the world. This is also the place where you can get custom titles to go with your car. C. WHAT ARE THE RED FLASHES FOR? During time attack, you may have noticed red flashes. No, you're not hallucinating, nor is your car getting tagged by the police for driving too fast, and if they catch you, they'll confiscate your card (and if you live in California, it will get ripped to shreds; they're doing that to real cars impounded for street races); this means that you are going at "ultimate speed" (at least, for that part of the course). You have to get a certain number of flashes in a course in order for the prefix of your title to change. D. WHY SHOULD I BOTHER TRYING TO GET THEM? Well, for one, bragging rights! It's one thing to be called "The Red Holy Emperor", but its even cooler to be called "The HIGHWAY Holy Emperor"! You'll have to admit, mastery of a course will garner respect (at least for your driving ability). The only side-effect I can think of is that now everyone will run away from you because you kick butt way too much, or at least, that's what they're thinking if they see that title. On the other hand, it is also a good indicator of how fast you're going in a time attack; even after you've gotten the title, its still a good indicator of whether or not you're going really fast in a course (although since it occurs in only some parts of a course, it is possible to have a very fast time without getting all the flashes). If you're getting those flashes, you're doing okay, besides the negative time that shows up when you pass a checkpoint. ********************************* * * * 2. GENERAL TIPS * * * ********************************* A. OPTIMAL SET-UP For all of those flashes, setting your horsepower at 680 is the optimal setting before you set out to get that title. This assumes though, that your car is fully tuned. If not, make sure you have at least 3-4 units of handling to go with that horsepower. It is certainly possible to get those flashes at a different setting, but having your car at grip at 680 makes it doable and comfortable, which brings me to my next point... B. WATCH OUT FOR THAT... WALL! If you make wall contact on any part of the course around 5 seconds before you hit that red flash, you're screwed. You typically won't be able to get your speed back up to the required minimum to get that flash. This is why handling is very important. You want to be able to control your car enough that you get the fastest speed possible without hitting anything before that or drifting too far. Which also brings me to... C. THE NEED FOR SPEED Remember, the whole point is to be FAST ENOUGH through that point! 680HP is the minimum required, and for that setup, you DON'T WANT TO LOSE TOO MUCH SPEED THROUGH THE TURNS! If your car is set to drift or dangerous, it will lose way too much speed to go through the turns without hitting something, and it won't make it up to speed even if you don't hit anything! Being able to do that requires a lot of control during the drift, and it is certainly not for beginners or intermediates. At the same time though, even with a grip setup, it is still possible to lose too much speed simply because you turn too much. Some turns only require a gentle turn without holding it for too long. This is especially true in C1 Outbound and Central Belt Line, where even if you make it through the center divider without a scratch, you end up with a tad less speed than required because you jerked the wheel too much. For little turns like these, keep your speed constant or increasing as much as possible by keeping your turns as little as possible. ********************************* * * * 3. COURSES * * * ********************************* The setup for this section is like this: A. Flashes: Location: 1. Difficulty: ... Title: These were done using the S30, the old Fairlady 240 Z (my Devil Z, mwahahaha), so the techniques may be slightly different depending on the drive train, especially if you're using a 4WD like a R32. And now without further ado: A. C1 INBOUND Flashes: 4 Locations: 1.) Right where you start off, around 12.9km left; 271+ kph Just push the pedal to the metal. Try to cut in close through those walls as much as possible, but without making too much tire squeal going out of the turn. Weave in through the small turns as straight as you can, and just turn gently on the last left. The flash is right after you exit that turn. Difficulty: Easy 2.) After the first red s-turn when you pass under the tunnel, around 4.1 km left; 265+ kph Grrr, this one's annoying. It's very easy to hit the walls as you do that s-turn. If you exit that s-turn under 240 kph, forget getting that flash and start over. You have to get the hang of it and find your groove; let off the pedal before you turn, but only for a very short while, and try to cut into the wall. Halfway into that turn, turn VERY hard to your left. Downshift and let off if need be, but take care to not let off too much. I did that once and it pissed me off royally. Difficulty: Hard 3 and 4.) In close succession, as you go through the two center dividers, around 3.9 and 3.8km left; 300+kph and 290+ kph respectively This one is semi-hard if you're doing it for the first time. The first of these two flashes is dead easy, as you can go through the first center divider with your foot down. The second part is highly intimidating though; you're actually trying to fit the camel through the eye of a needle at the speed of a sewing machine, if that analogy fits. You have to turn to the right just enough so that you shoot through the hole, but at the same time stop short of slamming into the wall of the tunnel due to sheer inertia. The recommended path (and is the optimal path I know of, as I don't know how you can possibly go the other way without too much speed loss) is to take the first center divider through the right, turn a little to your right, and shoot through the left of the second center divider. I usually take it by turning so that it looks like I'm aiming the car towards the center divider, but because I'm already drifting a bit to the left, I miss it completely and take a straight path through the hole. Its hard to get the hang of at first, but once you get over your minor bout of claustrophobia, you'll find it is surprisingly easy to take. Difficulty: Easy (first one), Hard (second one, only if you let the center divider mess with your head) Title: C1 (e.g. "The Cyan Mistress" becomes "The C1 Mistress") B. C1 OUTBOUND Flashes: 3 (confirmed, supposedly 4, will fix in a later version) Locations: 1 and 2.) In close succession, as you go through the first center divider after the hard right; 300+ kph and 290+kph respectively Oh man, not this one again. Fortunately, you only have one center divider to be really worried about, and its set up so that you can shoot straight through it too! The only catch is that you don't get the second red flash through one of two things; a.) you hit the wall on your right as you turn left, or b.) you turn way too much to the left and go below 290kph (!@^%!^@#!%$@#%$!@). Just turn slightly left, and time it correctly so that you do it BEFORE you exit the divider. This will point your car to the left and it will avoid the railing on your right and get the flash. It doesn't matter which side you take it, as long as you don't hit anything or turn too much. Difficulty: Easy (first one, if you didn't hit anything after you make the hard right), Medium(second one) 3.) After the hard right, before you end the course, around 1.0 km left; 260+kph If you can time the turn right, you can make it even if you do hit the wall as you turn. Just make sure the hitting sound is more of a bump sound than a WHAM sound. It is preferable however if you don't hit the wall at all. Take the far left after you go through the 2 winding yellow turns (optimally you should end up here anyway). Then as you approach the red turn, point your car a little off to the right of the edge of the yellow and black bar. As soon as you shoot in, turn hard. The turn will automatically slow you down enough, so just maintain the steering wheel position (and maybe do a bit of counter-steering as you go) and downshift as you exit. Even in fourth, you should be able to hit that speed, but you'd want to be shifting to 5th as you hit the flash. I've seen people take that flash at around 275, and that's a comfortable cushion. Difficulty: Medium Title: C1 C. CENTRAL BELT HIGHWAY COUNTERCLOCKWISE Flashes: 2 (confirmed, but a friend says there are 3; I have to ask him first and see it for myself) Locations: 1 and 2.) See the descriptions for flashes 1 and 2 on C1 Outbound. Title: Wangan (e.g. "The Cyan Mistress" becomes "The Wangan Mistress") D. CENTRAL BELT HIGHWAY Flashes: 4 Locations: 1.) Around 20.5km left, after the hard right yellow turn and the slight left turn; 295+kph Dead easy. If you don't hit a thing and don't turn too hard on the yellow turn, you should be fine. Take note though that even though it is a yellow turn, you have to turn hard like it was a red one, like the one described for C1 Outbound. But again, because you actually have more room here, take advantage of it and let yourself drift to the edge of the left wall as close as you can to keep your speed up. Difficulty: Easy 2, 3 and 4.) See the descriptions for flashes 2, 3 and 4 on C1 Inbound, but change the kilometers remaining. Title: Wangan E. METROPOLITAN HIGHWAY Oh man, this is the big one! You need to put in more tokens (4 usually) just to play on this course, and with good reason; it takes 12 minutes to finish! It almost runs like the final stage in story mode, but much longer. But if you get all flashes, you get the final title. It's VERY hard to do because its tiring and so many things can go wrong (even I'M haven't gotten this one because I messed up one of the turns >_< ), but if you make it, you can say that you've mastered all the courses (because it does take up ALL of the courses!). Note that any descriptions I make can be referenced back to C1 Inbound and Outbound, the base courses. Flashes: 8 (!!!) Locations: 1.) See the description for the first flash of Central Belt Highway. 2.) Hard left turn after the second long CBH straightaway, where the slight right going into part of C1 Inbound was supposed to be; 265+kph This is like flash #3 for C1 Outbound, but you're going left instead of right. This one is kind of an exception to the rule of "Don't-hit-anything-right-before -the-flash". Downshift as you go into the turn, but instead of trying to cut into the turn, stay as close to the wall as possible. When the actual turn does come, turn hard to the left, but allow yourself to hit the wall and downshift to 3rd. Ride the wall, and then kind of bounce off it. It's tricky, but if you bounce off the wall at 185kph or higher, you should be fine. Difficulty: Medium 3 and 4.) See flashes 1 and 2 for C1 Outbound. 5.) See flash 1 for C1 Inbound, but instead of 270+kph, you must be 285+kph. It is much higher because unlike the start of C1 Inbound, you're running through that point at full tilt. It is also slightly more difficult. Difficulty: Medium 6, 7 and 8.) See flashes 2, 3 and 4 for C1 Inbound. Title: Highway (e.g. "The Cyan Mistress" becomes "The Highway Mistress") ********************************* * * * 4. EXTRA STUFF * * * ********************************* A. THE PERILS OF BEING "SPECIAL" Remember the 2 secret cars, the Celsior and Z31? (6,4,3, oh 6,4,3) They're pretty cool, aren't they? Especially the neon lights under the Celsior. I don't know how they're supposed to help handling, but they just look cool. Unfortunately... they're also nigh impossible to get titles with. Why is this? Well, the Celsior alone has a very bad disadvantage. It's really, really, slow! It's the slowest car in the game, and with bad handling to boot. And its massive. I've rarely seen anyone shoot that thing through flash #4 on C1 Inbound without hitting the walls, just because the back end smacks anything it gets its butt on. As for the Z31, it loses too much speed in the turns. I've seen my friend Ali, who happens to be the 25th highest (world) and 2nd highest (USA) time attacker on C1 Outbound, try it with his friend's Z31 and fail to get all the flashes. What this basically means is that the cars are very hard to keep at the speed needed to get the flash. You might have to be at 800HP just for that to work, especially for the Celsior (although I'm probably exaggerating here). I'm not saying it is impossible, just very, very hard. If there is anyone who knows of a Highway Ultimate or Valiant out there, please let me know how you got it! I'll make sure you get full credit for it. B. THE SPECIAL CAR TIME ATTACK There are two modes of time attack for the game; the one where you use your own car, and the second option lets you use the 3 special cars; Reina Akikawa's GT-R, Akio Asakura's Devil Z, and Tatsuya Shima's Blackbird (Personally, I like MY Devil Z better, but that's another story). You can't change modes from refuse to accept challengers once you choose it. Using any of these cars will still activate the red flashes; however, getting those flashes will NOT transfer to your title. It treats the car as if it doesn't have a title and won't give it a new one. Makes sense, actually, since its not your car... why should you get the title for using someone else's car? I did try that in the hope of getting Wangan on my friend's Z31, but to no avail. ********************************* * * * 5. CREDITS AND CONTACT * * * ********************************* I have to thank: - My friends Ali and Kris, who is some of the best players of the game, and taught me all I know. Go Diamond Stars! - The Cal Poly Pomona Student Center, where I first found the game - My friends Brandon and Randy; it was great racing with you guys ^_^ - the GameFAQ's community, for letting fellow gamers find help with their game - And last, but not least, God, for nothing else other than giving me a talent for racing and writing. I hope nobody has a problem with that. If you have anything to add, see something wrong, or would like to contact me, e-mail me at dmpikachu@yahoo.com with the word "FAQ" somewhere in the subject. Otherwise, I'll dismiss it as spam. And remember kids, politeness is a virtue!