Sunday, November 20, 2005
The ultimative racing game week
3 racing games in the top10 demo downloads ranking this week, this does look promising.
Need For Speed: Most Wanted, ToCa Race Driver 3 (2006), TrackMania Sunrise Extreme, World Racing 2... what else can you ask for?
I tried Most Wanted and Sunrise Extreme so far, so here is a little personal review:
Need for Speed Most Wanted
Big glitches on the physics side of the game. Not as bad as Underground1 or 2, but still bad. The steering is bad (but bearable) using keyboard, decent with a gamepad and using a wheel - scrap that, I don't recommend it unless you want to destroy your PC wheel. Still, the cars feel "fat" and very unrealistic on the track while the game physics constantly tries to find a way between understeering and drifting.
Gfx-wise I expected more but it still looks fine. "Tracks" could be more detailed though.
Sound is great, much better music than in the Underground parts and it simply suits more to a racing game. Especially the music during car chases is well chosen, thumbs up in the sound department.
Obviously EA brought back Pursuit mode which is the only game mode in Most Wanted which promises some good old NFS-fun if you know the series from back then. The bad side is that they seemed to have some problem with the AI so they gave the computer rigged cop cars - the AI cheats! In sprint races the game is too easy, even on hard setting. Big letdown.
The online lobby is an eye-catcher, but just an eye-catcher really. 4 cars on track max.? I do remember the time when there were 8+ cars allowed without the framerate suffering, why oh why Electronic Arts?
Even with only 4 cars on track, racing online with collision detection on is a very bad idea unless you like losing to the bad network code instead of your opponent. Cars warp around the place all the way, it's just like in Underground where you'd "lead" the race all the way and suddenly after the finish line it turns out that the warp car beat you. I simply don't recommend playing online with this title.
Besides, the lobby is very slow. Might be due to peak times, but still...
Amazingly, it still is a fun game - but only for a short while. I already have enough of it after playing the demo, why would I buy the full version? Give me reasons, EA!
More cars? No thanks, I'd have to unlock them in an endless grind.
More modes? Thank you, but they all seem boring except for pursuit.
More tracks? The track design of the demo tracks already seems boring, how bad can it be with the whole map unlocked?
TrackMania Sunrise Extreme
It's TrackMania, how could you be wrong playing this amazingly fast racing game? :)
On a side note, this is probably the only demo title which comes with a copy protection on-board. Only Nadeo knows why this is the case. I even had to reboot because it asked me to. Very weird.
Regarding the gameplay, nothing new. It still is the best racing title for perfectionists, hands down. Great graphics and the usual "lagging" music while loading are what makes this one of the best fun titles this year.
This is definately one of the few games this year that you can play for 20 minutes and still have a good time.
Need For Speed: Most Wanted, ToCa Race Driver 3 (2006), TrackMania Sunrise Extreme, World Racing 2... what else can you ask for?
I tried Most Wanted and Sunrise Extreme so far, so here is a little personal review:
Need for Speed Most Wanted
Big glitches on the physics side of the game. Not as bad as Underground1 or 2, but still bad. The steering is bad (but bearable) using keyboard, decent with a gamepad and using a wheel - scrap that, I don't recommend it unless you want to destroy your PC wheel. Still, the cars feel "fat" and very unrealistic on the track while the game physics constantly tries to find a way between understeering and drifting.
Gfx-wise I expected more but it still looks fine. "Tracks" could be more detailed though.
Sound is great, much better music than in the Underground parts and it simply suits more to a racing game. Especially the music during car chases is well chosen, thumbs up in the sound department.
Obviously EA brought back Pursuit mode which is the only game mode in Most Wanted which promises some good old NFS-fun if you know the series from back then. The bad side is that they seemed to have some problem with the AI so they gave the computer rigged cop cars - the AI cheats! In sprint races the game is too easy, even on hard setting. Big letdown.
The online lobby is an eye-catcher, but just an eye-catcher really. 4 cars on track max.? I do remember the time when there were 8+ cars allowed without the framerate suffering, why oh why Electronic Arts?
Even with only 4 cars on track, racing online with collision detection on is a very bad idea unless you like losing to the bad network code instead of your opponent. Cars warp around the place all the way, it's just like in Underground where you'd "lead" the race all the way and suddenly after the finish line it turns out that the warp car beat you. I simply don't recommend playing online with this title.
Besides, the lobby is very slow. Might be due to peak times, but still...
Amazingly, it still is a fun game - but only for a short while. I already have enough of it after playing the demo, why would I buy the full version? Give me reasons, EA!
More cars? No thanks, I'd have to unlock them in an endless grind.
More modes? Thank you, but they all seem boring except for pursuit.
More tracks? The track design of the demo tracks already seems boring, how bad can it be with the whole map unlocked?
TrackMania Sunrise Extreme
It's TrackMania, how could you be wrong playing this amazingly fast racing game? :)
On a side note, this is probably the only demo title which comes with a copy protection on-board. Only Nadeo knows why this is the case. I even had to reboot because it asked me to. Very weird.
Regarding the gameplay, nothing new. It still is the best racing title for perfectionists, hands down. Great graphics and the usual "lagging" music while loading are what makes this one of the best fun titles this year.
This is definately one of the few games this year that you can play for 20 minutes and still have a good time.
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