Rush 2: Recompiled

Rush 2: Extreme Racing USA, the 1998 N64 racer, running natively on your PC with widescreen and ultrawide support, high framerates, sharp text, and improved controller support

You need to bring your own copy of the game. Nothing from the original cartridge is included here.

Join the Discord or watch the YouTube video introducing the project.

What you get

• Widescreen. Play in 4:3 like the original, 16:9, or expand the view to fill whatever window size you like.
• Smooth framerate. The game still runs at its original speed of 30fps but interpolated up to any arbitrary framerate, including a variable refresh rate mode that follows your display
• HUD where you want it. Keep the speedometer and lap info in the classic 4:3 spot, or push it out to the edges of the screen.
• No pop-in. Turn off level of detail and every car and building is drawn at full quality, no matter how far away it is.
• Crisp fonts. All the menu text and HUD numbers have been redrawn so they stay sharp at any resolution. You can switch back to the original blurry ones if you miss them.
• Upscaled textures (optional). Turn on Texture Upscaling in the graphics settings and the cars and tracks get smoothed at 2x or 4x with HQ2x/HQ4x, the filters emulators use for texture enhancement. The HUD and menus are left alone. Prefer another upscaler, like Topaz Gigapixel? Dump the textures with one click, upscale them with it, and install the results as your own texture pack.
• Saves that just work. Your players and records are kept on a virtual Controller Pak using the save file uses the same format as emulators.
• Rumble. Supported on any controller that can rumble and at the same time as saves. Enhanced rumble gives crashes, wall scrapes and screeching tires each their own feel on every controller, and shakes the side of the car that was hit on the haptics of every DualSense plugged in with USB, Steam Controller and Steam Deck, and on the triggers of Xbox One and Series controllers.
• Up to 4 players, any controllers. Xbox, PlayStation and most other controllers work, plus keyboard. Pick which controller belongs to which player and the game remembers it next time.
• Rebind everything. The game's own Controls screen now lets you map any button, trigger, stick or key. It shows the right button icons for your controller.
• Online races. Up to 8 players on separate computers, on your network or over the internet: host a lobby from the Online tab and share your address, or join one. No server needed. Race, stunt and Rush 2049 battle arenas (docs/online.md).
• Split screen. Two player races can run side by side in addition to the original top and bottom.
• AI opponents. Choose the car, paint and rims of each computer opponent in the General tab.
• Ghost races. Previously a 2049 exclusive feature. Record your runs and race against your own ghost car.
• Unlocks. Earn cars, tracks and engines through an UNLOCKS shop. You can disable and revert to original Rush 2 behavior if you wish

Rush 2049 extras

If you also own San Francisco Rush 2049 for the N64 (US version), you can point the game at that ROM and unlock a couple of additional features:

• Wings. Hold the Wings button when you're airborne to pop out wings and glide. They handle just like they did in 2049.
• The 2049 tracks. All six race tracks from Rush 2049 show up in the track select
• The 2049 cars. All thirteen Rush 2049 cars join the car select after Rush 2's own.
• The 2049 music. Each of the six 2049 tracks plays its own Rush 2049 song.
• The 2049 stunt arenas. The stunt arenas are playable from the track select.
• Battle arenas. Eight deathmatch arenas in the BATTLE row, with weapons, pickups, and arrows pointing to the other cars. Computer-controlled drones can fill the arenas, and weapons can also be turned on in regular arena races with a cheat. The track select's BATTLE row turns any race into a battle race: a row of weapon and power-up pickups on every checkpoint line past the start, and drones that grab them and shoot.
• Coins. Collect 2049's coins, which are counted per player in the Progress tab and count toward unlocks.

Dreamcast disc (experimental)

Rush 2049 can also be loaded from a Dreamcast disc image instead of the N64 ROM, and a Dreamcast Textures option uses the disc's textures with the N64 version. This is the more experimental option.

San Francisco Rush extras

If you also own San Francisco Rush: Extreme Racing for the N64 (US version), you can point the game at that ROM on the Games tab and unlock:

• The Rush 1 tracks. All seven race tracks from the original San Francisco Rush
• The Rush 1 music. The nine Rush 1 race songs play on its tracks, picked at random.
• Rush 1 car decals. Some of Rush 1's own unique paint jobs are available as a stripe option.
• Keys. Collect the keys hidden on the Rush 1 tracks, which are counted per player in the Progress tab and count toward unlocks.

What you need

• A Windows 10 or 11 PC
• A graphics card that supports DirectX 12 or Vulkan (anything from the last several years should be fine)
• Your own ROM of Rush 2: Extreme Racing USA (North American version). .z64, .n64 and .v64 files all work.
• Optional: a ROM of San Francisco Rush 2049 (North American version) for the Rush 2049 extras
• Optional: a ROM of San Francisco Rush: Extreme Racing (North American version) for the Rush 1 tracks

Getting started

1. Put Rush2Recompiled.exe somewhere you like.
2. Run it.
3. The first time, it'll ask you to find your Rush 2 ROM. Point it at the file and you're in.

After that the game starts right away. It keeps its own copy of the ROM, so you can move or delete the original file if you want.

Shortcut: if you drop the ROM in the same folder as the exe, it'll find it on its own and skip the question.

Setting things up

Most options live in the settings menu (press Escape, or select).

• General: gameplay options, AI opponents' cars, background input and data location
• Graphics: window mode, resolution, aspect ratio, framerate, anti-aliasing, level of detail, fonts and texture upscaling
• Sound: race music per game, plus whether other cars' engines are heard
• Controls: choose which controllers (and the keyboard) can play, the split screen layout, and each save profile's steering, stick deadzone and rumble settings, with buttons to test each rumble effect
• Progress: see the keys and coins you've collected
• Games: pick your Rush 2049 and San Francisco Rush ROMs, then turn on their tracks, cars and Wings
• Cheats: unlock all tracks and cars, plus driving, survival, race and visual cheats. Enable the cheat menu first.

To change your button layout, use the game's own Controls screen, under Setup or from the pause menu. Pick a row, press A, then press the button you want for it.

Online multiplayer (experimental)

Up to 8 players can race on separate computers, on the same network or over the internet. There's no server: one player hosts a lobby and the others connect straight to them. Race, stunt and Rush 2049 battle arenas all work, and so do custom tracks as long as everyone has the mod.

• Host: open Settings > Online and press Host Lobby. Pick the number of players and the port (UDP 47100 by default) first if you want something else. The game asks your router to open the port by itself (UPnP) and shows the address to give your friends. If your router doesn't support that, forward the port by hand.
• Join: lobbies on your own network are listed in the Online tab with a Join button. For anyone else, type the host's address into Join by Address.
• Play: the host goes through the game's normal menus and everyone else follows along. Each player picks their own profile and car. The race starts once everyone is ready and has the track. While you're in a lobby, the gameplay settings are the host's, and yours come back when you leave.

Everyone needs the same version of the game, and a copy of any ROM the chosen track needs (for example Rush 2049 for its tracks). Every computer runs the whole race itself and only controller inputs are sent, so a steady connection matters more than a fast one. This is still new: expect lots of rough edges

Where your stuff is saved

Settings and saves live in %LOCALAPPDATA%\Rush2Recompiled. Paste that into the File Explorer address bar to get there.

Your saves are in the saves folder: rush2.n64.us.mpk (the game's own save), rush2.n64.us.json (records, cars, keys, coins and unlocks of the added games) and ghosts. Back the folder up if you care about your records.

Texture upscaling keeps its files in the texture_upscale folder there: the upscaled textures it has made (so nothing is upscaled twice), and the dump and upscaled folders for your own upscales.

Want to keep everything on a USB stick or next to the game? Turn on portable mode in the General tab under Data Location. Your data moves into the game's folder the next time you launch.

Modding: mod.json

Every mod is a folder or .rtz in the mods folder (Settings > Mods > Open Mods Folder) with a mod.json at its root:

{
  "game_id": "rush2",
  "id": "my_mod",
  "display_name": "My Mod",
  "version": "1.0.0",
  "authors": ["You"],
  "minimum_recomp_version": "0.0.0"
}

description and short_description are optional, and a thumb.png beside it is the mod's picture. A field that's missing or written wrong doesn't hide the mod: it gets a default (the file name for id, 0.0.0 for versions) and the mod's page in the Mods menu lists the problems under "mod.json". A mod added while the game runs shows up when you press the refresh button next to Open Mods Folder; a mod with code (mod_syms.bin) only turns on after a restart.

Modding: replacing models (experimental)

Any model in the game can be swapped for your own mesh, of any detail. Run Dump Models to get every model as a .glb in asset_dump/models. Open the one you want in Blender or a similar program, edit it or model over it in the same position and scale, and export it as glTF Binary (.glb) with its textures embedded and no Draco compression. Keep the dumped file name. Make a mod folder in the mods folder holding a mod.json (with "game_id": "rush2") and your file under rush2/models/, for example rush2/models/tracks/ALCATRAZ/ALCATRAZL4156.glb. You can zip the folder into an .rtz. Turn the mod on in the Mods menu, and the model changes the next time the game loads it. Only the look changes: cars and tracks still drive and collide as before. A whole car can also go in rush2/cars/<CAR>.glb, where it takes the player's paint and dents. tools/car_mod.py can build that from a mesh and texture.

Modding: replacing textures

Any texture can be redrawn or upscaled with whatever tool you like. In Settings > Graphics, under Your Own Upscales, press Dump Textures: every texture in your ROMs is written as a .png to asset_dump/textures, named after what it belongs to. Edit or upscale the images at any size, and save them under asset_dump/user_texture_pack in the same folders, or all in one folder. The file name only has to start with the dumped name, so an upscaler's suffix is fine. Then press Install Upscaled Textures. It builds mods/rush2_custom_textures.rtz and turns it on right away, and that one file is what you share. Car bodies are dumped painted violet, yellow and cyan to show where the player's paint goes; keep those areas apart, and the game repaints them in the chosen colors. Textures the game makes as you play, like paint jobs and stripes, are made from your versions automatically.

Modding: custom tracks (experimental)

You can add whole new race tracks. Build the track in Blender, mark its surfaces, finish line and checkpoints by object name, draw the racing line the computer cars follow, and export it as track.glb. Next to it goes a short track.toml with the track's name and, if you like, its timer, fog color, music and surfaces of your own. Add a logo and a track select model if you want them. Put the files in a mod under rush2/tracks/<your track>/ and turn the mod on. The game converts the track, lists it on the track select after Rush 2049's tracks, and writes a report of anything wrong to the track_reports folder. Custom tracks race forward, backward or mirrored, with computer opponents, records and ghosts. To see a track the way the game loads it, and watch the computer cars race it, without starting the game, use Trackview. The full guide is docs/custom_tracks.md.

Credits

Built with N64Recomp, N64ModernRuntime, RecompFrontend and the RT64 renderer. Texture upscaling uses hqx (LGPL 2.1, in lib/hqx). Big thanks to everyone behind those projects.

Track banner images for the San Francisco Rush tracks and Rush 2049's Metro and Presidio by Bunny.

Rush 2 Recompiled logo by POOTERMAN https://www.deviantart.com/pooterman

Rush 2 and Rush 2049 belong to their respective owners. This project isn't affiliated with them and doesn't include any of their game data.

Curious how it works or want to build it yourself? See docs/BUILDING.md.