Crashday

Crashday is a destruction derby/racing/car stunts game co-developed by Moon Byte Studios and Replay Studios and published by Atari. It was initially released on 23 February, 2006. The remastered version called "Crashday: Redline Edition" was later developed by Moonbyte and published by 2tainment on 10 August, 2017.

Gameplay

The game combines various styles of proceeding racing games. Several modes are available, including several race variants, a Destruction Derby-like arena, various capture-the-flag variants, and stunt competition. The cars can be upgraded to have weapons, with which to attack competitors in both race and arena modes. The stunt mode involves the player driving around a purpose-built stunt track, performing flips, rolls and other stunts to receive points. The more combo stunts you perform, the more points you receive. The hold the flag mode contains a flag that should be driven through a number of randomly selected checkpoints. The flag can be stolen from another player by toughing his/her car. Race mode includes a mode whereby the last car on each lap is destroyed. There is also a race type featuring a minimum speed that rises with each checkpoint to avoid a bomb being detonated.

Vehicles

Main Article: Vehicles

Customization

Main Article: Customization

Career

Main Article: Career

Damage

Main Article: Damage

Soundtrack

Main Article: Soundtrack

Game Versions

Versions available of Crashday:

1.0 The European CD-ROM installation version of the game
1.1 (Official) An update that could be downloaded from Crashday's official website. It prevents aftbur.dbs from being modified, and for unknown reasons causes numerical values to be displayed on screen erroneously. It also fixes some small issues with the physics.
1.1 (Unofficial) Identical to 1.1 Official with the exceptions that it doesn't overwrite the older 1.0 version executable file, and it does not require a CD-ROM play.
1.2 1.2 was initially, the US version of the game. However the 1.2 No-CD executable's source is unknown, and is identical to 1.1 with the exception that it removes the values displayed erroneously in 1.1.
1.3 Previous version of Redline Edition which was exclusive for the QA team
1.4 Unknown version
1.5 (Redline Edition) The official version of Redline Edition

Modifications To Crashday

Crashday's file architecture is unarchived, which makes it a popular game for modders. Ever since Crashday was released, players have been making modifications to Crashday. The most notable of all mods is Jane's Mod, which comes in three versions, each replacing the previous. Jane's mods aim to make cars faster, more controllable, more fun, whilst optimising the game's performance. The latest version of Jane's Mods is v2, and use of older versions of Jane's mods is now considered cheating in the online community.

An SDK was available on Crashday's official site, and some fan-made applications allow developments, including SmashD's Crashday Tools and the X-Mod.

Master Server Shutdown & The New Masterserver

On 25 August 2009 Atari announced to a hardcore dedicate that developer Replay Studios had filed for insolvency. As a result of Replay Studios ceasing operations, Crashday's Master Server was shut down permanently, as well as official forums.

In September and October 2009 the availability of an alternate, "New" Master Server had been announced. A well-known dedicate who lives in Holland, going by the persona RichDutch has given permission for his internet connection to be used for a new server, and donated a disused computer to be used as the Master Server itself, and this server was up and running by November.

In December 2009, a Domain crashday.ath.cx was acquired, and the final version of the so-called New Master Server was up and running. This Domain was essential, as if the Server's IP address changes (A Static IP could not be used for reasons that remain unclear), the Domain can be refreshed allowing a connection from client to server to be re-established. This allowed the Master Server to be shut down for maintenance or in event of a system failure, without disrupting the community.

The Master Server worked by running a small MS-DOS application that gathers information about hosts, and submits that data to clients on request, allowing the client to view Host Name, Game Type, Maximum Players, Track, Car(s) Available, Game Version Number, Nationality and Game Status. This software was provided to hardcore dedicate Jazwa by Crashday's Lead Programmer Robert Clemens, who passed it onto the New Master Server owner, RichDutch. RichDutch later set up the Domain using DynDNS for the static IP.

In order to connect to the Master Server, players needed to either download modified network configuration files, or modify them manually using a basic text editor.