it's not entirely different, it still has to do with computer games. But this is

the Texaco 2001 Summer Promotion kit: "Need for Speed," item number who cares and

an 800 number that may or may not work anymore. This is a very nondescript

package because this is something that was just sent to all sorts of vendors

around the country here in the US in 2001. Maybe elsewhere too, I know Texaco is

a pretty international company. But yeah I remember seeing these back then very

briefly. And then I forgot about them until I ran across these packages once

again on eBay some years ago. So, just a tiny bit of context here, even though

there's not a whole lot to go on: this was apparently some sort of partnership

between Texaco, the petroleum company and distributor, and Electronic Arts and some

kind of manufacturer of die-cast model cars. I'm sure I'll find out more in a

moment when we get this package open but yeah. Because not only does it come with

artwork and branding for the Need for Speed game but it also comes with an

exclusive demo of the game itself for Windows PCs. Now there was a demo that

you could download for free online, but these, as far as I know, were

exclusive to the packages that were sold in Texaco stores. So gas stations, service

stations, truck stops, what-have-you. I remember seeing these next to the cash

register in various gas stations just kind of stacked up next to the Slim Jims

and chewable tobacco. Anyway let's go ahead and get this thing open because

I've had this for a while and I've been itching to get into it and I figured "ahh

why not to unbox it?" And we're gonna try out the demos as well.

[box-cutting sounds interspersed with jazz tunes]

Okay, well it looks like we got a note in here from the seller I got it from.

It's just saying which ones that it came with. As far as I know though this was

supposed to come with at least one example of each of the different car

packs that were available. Okay! Oh wow, this brings back some memories. I worked

in retail for... uh, too long. Setting end cap planograms and ohmuhgahd it's all

coming back and I don't like it. But anyway I'm gonna go ahead and separate

these out into the individual kits but you can kind of see what's going on there.

All right so here are the five different ones that you could collect!

So yeah each one of these comes with a different race car model based on a

real-world car. And then each one of these will also come with their own

individual demo for Porsche Unleashed. It is kind of an odd promotion if you think

about it. Like you have NASCAR and CART racing in here, and this is a promo for the game

Porsche Unleashed which is all about racing through histories in classic

Porsches, and there's nothing to do with any of these American racing things.

And there have been other Need for Speed things sold in retail stores too, like

Walmarts, and in fact they still sell them for different modern games like

here's a Forza Motorsport one sold by Hot Wheels.

This one actually makes sense because this is a car and a configuration that

you can actually get in the game. And look at all those like, I kind of want to

collect all those. I just picked this up randomly when I saw it the other week

and was like "hey that reminds me of my things that I, you know!" All right let's

go ahead and take a look at these individually here and see what we get.

All right so first up here is the "Mario's Last Car." It's interesting, it

seems to be that the car was like secondary, they were really selling the

demo to Porsche Unleashed and the collector car is listed as a bonus.

That's interesting. But yes "custom CD-ROM game inside!" And this comes with the 1988

944 S Turbo Coupe. "Texaco offers you an exclusive collection of the

award-winning game Need for Speed Porsche Unleashed by Electronic Arts. This sampler

series offers you the mind-numbing..." Mind-numbing? That's kind of a weird

way to put it. "...open road racing experience that Need for Speed ™ is

known for." Look at that it's even got installation instructions on the back

and some controls right there for the game. So here's the company looks like put

it out: Equity Marketing Incorporated, Los Angeles, California. Yeah I was wondering

who was responsible for actually putting out this package for EA and Texaco and I

guess that answers that question. I got a little bit off track there but

let's just take a quick look at what the other ones are. So this one here with the

2000 911 Turbo, that was an exciting car in 2000. Came with the bonus car the

number 28 custom Texaco race car. Okay so car number 3 is the 2000 Boxster S and

the bonus car is the number 28 Ricky Rudd race car, that one is the

official Texaco car. Next up the fourth car here is the special Havoline race

car number 28. Mmkay. And then the version of the game that it comes with, or the

demo, is the 1959 Porsche 356. Very cool classic convertible. And then finally the

fifth car here it comes with the custom Texaco race car and this is the 1973 911

Carrera RS 2.7 coupe. Mmm that is a lust-worthy mode of transportation.

Okay so let's go ahead and open up Mario Andretti's last car here.

[cutting, shuffling noises] Alright.

Some nice details on there. It's not quite up to the quality of something like a Hot

Wheels or even a Matchbox but it does have rubber wheels and some nice little writing on

there I mean, like, I like the decals. So this is the company that makes it? 'Action'

something or other. I'm not familiar with that brand at all.

There's the CART logo right there, so it is an officially licensed CART

product at least. Yeah cool. [plop]

Okay. And now let's just get to the CD which it looks

like that opens up on the back here. [light slicing noises]

It doesn't look like there's any really

easy way to open that... so we're just gonna go for it. I'm curious what the CDs

look like exactly because I don't really recall actually having seen what's

inside here. Most sellers just leave these sealed. Well that's interesting.

So we got the game logo right there, "sampler version," got Texaco and EA logos and then

it says which one of these is on the disc.

And it actually says on the back here too, yeah it says the violet package, it says it

comes with the 944 coupe. And here we go, went ahead and opened all of them got

them all laid out nicely here for you. Each of the cars are pretty much the

same quality, actually not that bad the more I look at them. They just feel like

really cheap in terms of the metal but the details are nice visually. And of

course the CD-ROMs themselves I mean, they're proper CD-ROM pressings, they look

good. The only thing really distinguishing them, of course other than the text, is

that little color that associates with the car demo that it comes with. Enough

unboxing teasing let's go ahead and install these demos on Windows 98! I'm

curious if they come with the same track or anything like that, y'know I'm just curious.

Okay so I'm gonna go ahead and try these demos out in the order of the

release of the cars that we'll be demoing, starting with the 1959 356.

[engine rev sound]

Hm, this is already different! "This sampler version is intended for promotional

purposes only," and blah blah legal stuff. So this autorun looks pretty much like

what you would get with the full game, except it's way laggier. And it has

these different menus here, what is this "buy the full game," what does that do.

Website probably? That's an offline website, that's interesting. "Buy the game

get a free die-cast miniature race car complete with Need for Speed decals! Hurry

this order is available while supplies last." Okay so apparently there was also a

Texaco version of Porsche Unleashed? I mean seriously yeah, "type promotion

code Texaco when you order online." Man. I'm curious what that car was that it

came with or the decals or whatever. Alright let's go ahead and play here,

"install the car, race, register" yeah let's just install this car. So this is known

as Texaco Web Demo 3 apparently. Wonder why they chose this one to be the third

demo? Clearly my sorting system by age of the car's release in real life is a much

better way to sort things out. Heh, so it looks like it put it in the Electronic

Arts folder with my full versions of the rest of the games as Texaco Web Demo 3.

Okay, let's try this out. Ahh I was wondering how it handled this!

So you get a custom menu here just in the autorun and it shows which cars are

installed. Okay so let's check just this one and then we'll install the rest of the cars.

[whooshing menu sound plays]

The user is "tex." Sure let's go with tex. All right well, that's one

thing that's different immediately: there are no background images here and

there's no music either. Kind of makes sense, the music it does say it's on but

nothing is playing. And of course pretty much everything else is blanked out as

you would expect. So I'll just go straight into single player here, we have

difficulty selection -- go with advanced. And we'll do a quick race here and of

course that is the only car that we can select. And just the one track, the Côte d'Azur.

Makes sense, that is pretty much the first track that you get in the game if

I recall. We can at least choose any color we want for the 356 A convertible

here. And we'll put the roof down because heck yeah. And we can select some

opponents, we'll just do one.

[vrooooooooom]

[more engine revving]

"Three! Two! One! Go!" Well it's Need for Speed five,

just on one track with one car. Which you know, that's pretty much what the demo

was for just the one you could download online for free for anyone.

I only tried it very briefly because I just ended up buying the full game

anyway because I knew I wanted it. Whoops. There we go. All right well that's pretty

much all I wanted to know, so let's go ahead and install the other cars and see

if we do get any other tracks or anything else with that but I'm

doubting it. Okay so I have all five discs installed and they all go into the

same folder here, in Program Files\Electronic Arts\

Need for Speed Texaco Web Demo folder. And we've got five demo folders here.

And it's kind of weird it has installed everything five times, the only thing

that's different is of course the car information. So each one of these has

each separate car. Like we saw earlier all of them are right here able to be

selected so there really are five different games. It's just a kind of a

messy situation but yeah. This also means that if you changed any of the options

like say, miles per hour to kilometers an hour or the graphics options... then yeah,

you'll have to change that every time you switch cars. It's the price you pay

for not having the full version. Oh wow so you do get a different track per car!

Interesting! So we've got Corsica here let's go ahead and just try this out.

And here we are, a totally new car, new track.

"Three! Two! One! Go!"

Uou actually do have some pretty good incentive for collecting all five!

Y'know, or I guess really just buy the full version because wow, what a pain to

have to switch completely different programs every time you want to try

another car and track combination. Although it makes me wonder if you can

combine all of them -- oops I was not paying attention -- if you could combine

all of them into one. I might have to try that here after we try all these

individual ones. All right and this one comes with the Alps track.

And we had a lot more pre-made colors here, we're just gonna go with nice

bright red. Yeah that's crazy to me that each one of these actually comes with a