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After the less than lukewarm response to Need for Speed: Carbon and the unmitigated disaster that was Need for Speed: ProStreet, EA and Black Box were pretty sure that they finally had a winner in their hands in form of Need for Speed: Undercover. More so when you take into consideration how long time fans of the series have been clamouring for more of NFS dipped in the same goodness that made Most Wanted so enjoyable. So, having nothing better to do than to appease the moneybags fans and gain back some of the lost ground that the series had to concede to other stellar racing titles this year, Black Box decided to throw the cops into the mix again, introduce a new “Heroic Driving Engine” (HDE) and pray to every conceivable god and set fire to little effigies and hope that this is the winning formula that will get the gamers flocking back to them again.
Whether it actually manages to do that is a pretty difficult question to answer considering how easy it is to brush off the game as another one in the succession of disasters that have rolled out of the Need for Speed camp over the last few years. The NFS series, in its later years and newer avatars, has all but stereotyped the half-breed Simulation/Arcade racing genre, completely dominating the casual and pro race-game circuits across India. Mirroring what’s in style every particular year, NFS hit on the tuner culture with Underground and its sequel, re-inventing itself with flashy cars, night-time racing across neon lit stretches blurring past the windshield at 200+ mph and the adrenaline rush that kicked into our bloodstreams every time the car got a shot of nitrous. Taking a page out of The Fast and The Furious plus clones, Most Wanted went one step further with its open world, frantic police chases, cheesy yet entertaining cut-scenes, all gelling together to make for one of the most fun games in the franchise this side of Porsche Unleashed. Undercover, in typical EA / NFS fashion is a Frankenstein created by salvaging all the best elements from the previous successful iterations, which technically, should make it the best in the series.
The month of May seems to have started off on a great note, what with E-Xpress Interactive playing Santa and leaving us a PC preview copy of the highly anticipated multi-platform game GRID. Knowing the rich history that Codemasters has when it comes to the racing games genre, the racing buffs in us were eager to try out the latest offering from their able-stables. Certainly then, braving the Mumbai traffic to rush back home was something that we were not really too keen upon. However, once back home and having installed the game, it just took us a couple of minutes into the game to know that all the trouble was worth it.
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2007 was a good year for racing games. Fans weren’t exactly spoilt for choice, but it was more a case of quality over quantity. There was something for everyone; Forza Motorsport 2 for the purists and car enthusiasts, DiRT for some off-road escapades and the best car damage ever, and the highly underrated and overlooked PGR4 with its addictive pick-up-and-play approach.
Like in most other genres in 2007, the Xbox 360 came out on top here was well. Forza 2 and PGR4 were exclusive to Microsoft’s console, while DiRT came to the PlayStation 3 months after it did on the Xbox 360.
But 2008 is a new year, and it’s already off to a smashing start – literally. Here’s a look at what racing fans can look forward to in 2008. Once again, there’s something for everyone – simulation, arcade and even some combat racing. And Sony fanboys can finally stop sulking now, because from the looks like it, the PS3 has got some heavy-hitters lining up on the grid.
Okay, seriously. The one single word that came to mind when I saw this track listing was “w00t”! This has easily got to be one of the best track listings for a game and any game that features a song by Killswitch Engage absolutely must deserve props.
The EA website has confirmed today that some of the tracks included on the new Burnout game include “My Curse” by Killswitch Engage, GNR’s “Paradise City” (how convenient!), Seether’s “Fake It” and Jane’s Addition’s “Stop!” as some of the tracks that will be featured in the game.
FINALLY!!
Are you sick of being penalized even by your games for banging into other cars, or not sticking to the driving line? Are you fueled by a mad rage to empty that nitrous boost and go fast that you seem to be caught in a time warp? Do you have an insatiable need to crash your ride mercilessly into someone else’s and turn the most sophisticated speed machine into ten cents worth of scrap metal in 1.8 seconds? Is your middle name “Speed” or “Crash”? If you answered “yes” to any of those questions, then, Burnout is the game for you, my friend.
For years we’ve been driving like the crazed, dosed-up maniacs that we are in EA’s and Criterion’s flagship mega-destructive racer and starting today, we’ll finally be able to take the latest Burnout game, cheekily titled Paradise, out for a test drive. And no, we definitely won’t be bringing it back in one piece.
The demo is now available on Xbox LIVE Marketplace and the PlayStation Store and weighs in at lesser than 900 MB, allowing us hours of fun pulling off hairbrained stunts and the most spectacular crashes possible in both single as well as multiplayer modes. Showing off the new EasyDrive matchmaking service and the Burnout Mugshots with the PlayStation Eye / Xbox LIVE Vision cameras, the demo allows up to four maniacal speed demons to trade paint and other assorted car parts online in a sadistic orgy of screeching, rending metal across three FreeBurn challenges, before the full game crash-lands into our lap come January 22, 2008.
Stay tuned for our impressions on the demo tomorrow, provided we can actually take some time to put the controller down and spend some time typing them out.
Yeah, so the last article I posted didn’t actually say Part 2, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t!
In part 3 of our WCG 2007 (and definitely our final article on this event, we bring you an interview with one of the WCG participants – Ajay Chekalia. We also interviewed another gentleman who pretty much kicked ass at Counter Strike : Amitoj Duggal, however, due to extremely fucked up audio, there’s no way we can put it up here.
We spoke to Ajay about the event and what he thought about it. He shared some interesting insights with us and explained the advantages of using a wheel for racing games, the super-quantum flux theory and why Freud dreamt of trains going into tunnels.
An interesting (but we found amusing) point he made, was the fact that once you’ve played 1 racing sim, you’ve played them all. Ajay came 2nd on day 1, in PGR3, considering that the only other contender was his friend, but overall he ranked 4th in the Delhi leg of the tourney – but this was the 1st time EVER, he’d played the game. So all his practice hours were pretty much spent with NFS Carbon. Yeah – you got it. NFS Carbon is the shit!
Overall, this guy pretty much knew what he was talking about and we found it quite a delightful experience talking to him. Good luck in Mumbai, old chap. Have a jolly good time and bring us back some goodies. Perhaps we’ll invite you over to a cup of Earl Grey, lad!
Download the video here.
Burnout Paradise E3 2007 Gameplay Trailer
Strap yourself in and get ready for the ride of a lifetime!