Past meets present: TX-1

Namco’s Pole Position, released to arcades in 1982, was a massive hit. The kind that shifts the entire direction of the industry and what it spends its time creating. It was effectively the first racing sim out there, and literally changed the game by emphasizing passing other cars and where you finished instead of just staying on the road: you were racing against a clock, you were racing against other cars, and you were racing against yourself. That you could do all of this from a faux-3D perspective in 1982 only made it that much more appealing and a standout for arcade crowds — such was its staying power and technological achievements that Pole Position managed to win a Coin-Op Game of the Year Award in 1984, two years after release.Pole Position didn’t have to be the final word on what a racing sim looked like, however. Namco gets much of the credit for that, with Sega soaking up most of the rest: the two went back-and-forth in the 80s and 90s on these points, in a literal arms…