Paradise city, were the grass is green and the girls are pretty. Though the last lot did have nicer eyes.

I think Tom has a prerequisite that he can't be friends with you unless your a geek, and I am a big ol' geek. Even next to Tom, yes he may have the moniker of Geeky Tom but you betta believe I taught him everything he knows.

Back in our heyday we laid waste to numerous video games, completely sustaining the trade-in market of Sheffield. But there was one game he missed, and boy did he miss out.

Burnout Revenge was an immense game in every respect, you don't often get games that are close to perfect and you least of all expect it to be a racing game of all things. Lets get this clear, racing games suck! Bottom line. You go round and round trying to shave half a second off another repetitive lap, wow, rewarding.

So how can I say Burnout Revenge was near perfect?

I shall tell you.

Very simple really, its bloody fun. Now this was before the arm waving joy of the wii and games were much more serious and reserved back then. Burnout though just made you wwwwwoooo at your tv. Sweet.

And so we come to Burnout Paradise. A whole new beast. A short while a go I played a demo and was blown away. Burnout is simple, drive eye bleedingly fast and smash stuff. So imagine you can go eye bleedingly fast and smash stuff in a free roaming environment.



Never crossed your mind? Course it didn't, it's insane. A free roaming driving game! Evil genius. Not just that but it works, you speed across the city stumbling (at mind blowing speed) across hidden paths and collectibles, then when you fancy something more structured you pull up at a junction, away you go.

The system just works. The important thing with this game is speed and in no time at all you can be doing any number of things from straight up races to stunt runs and road rage( thats were you have to smash fellow racers from the road). Win and you get upgrades on your license and new cars.

So your having ridiculous fun, yes, but how does it look. If I'm honest I don't care because I'm having so much fun, then I manually compact my car with the use of a boost and a wall. Sweet mother of god does it look good! In beautifully detailed slow-mo you get to witness every crushing moment. The beauty does not end there however because Paradise is skillfully rendered and even at the brake neck speeds you can't help glancing in awe. Then of course you crash, but at least it looks good.

So I'm burning through the streets of Paradise from the tight hair raising city streets to the long winding roads in the mountains when I realize something. There's some very important things missing. Key things even.

1.No crashes
2.No aftertouch
3.No reset

One of the most fun elements in any Burnout game is the crash mode. Here you aim your car down a road and try to create as much damage as possible, fun but surprisingly challenging. Paradise however doesn't have this. Why? May have something to do with the free roaming, frankly I don't give a cheese cracker. I want my crashes!

Another element from previous games is the aftertouch. This meant if you crashed during a race you could maneuver your wreck and stop other racers passing you. Very satisfying. Unless its missing, which it is.

And finally, the oh so horrendous, the oh so painful problem of no restarts. You fail a race that's it. You want to run that race again? Then you have to drive all the way back to the start. I read the idea was there was enough races available so you can just start another. Screw you I want that race, but no I have to drive all the way back, great.

So other than the restarts the game is held back by the fact it follows a near perfect game. Is that fair? Not at all. Tough luck, you shouldn't of called it Burnout then. Still I am going to play it till my eyes melt in their sockets and I'm forced to play by sound alone, like some gaming monk.

I told a lie. They didn't get rid of crash mode altogether, they have this thing called showtime, its...well its a bit silly but quite honestly its still fun. Damn it I love fun. Check this out.

1 comments:

Geeky Tom said...

I remember sitting 2cm from the screen, my eyes burning... my back hunched over, tearing Burnout an new a-hole. Good times

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