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Not better, just different
posted by Twizlex (DAUPHIN, PA) Sep 7, 2006
Member since Jul 2006
79 out of 87 gamers (91%) found this review helpful
Test Drive Unlimited is not the best racing game out there, nor is it even the best on the 360 right now; HOWEVER, it IS a good racing game and is definitely worth your time if racers are your thing. The biggest draw to this game is the Massively Open Online Racing, which is the name Atari is giving the online play in this game. Essentially, if you have an Xbox Live Gold account, you can drive around seamlessly with other real people from all over the world, flash your lights for a quick race, or just talk to them as you drive by. You're free to roam the entire island of Oahu (part of Hawaii), which offers up quite a large setting. The cars look nice, but not as nice as some other games (like PGR3), and they all handle differently, so that's a plus. I personally think they crapped out with the motorcycles, though. Also, there's no damage to cars, so scraping walls or even hitting another car head-on doesn't really do anything except slow you down. Also on the graphics end are the actual people. Man, talk about ugly. It's pretty obvious that not much time was spent there, but in the long run, who really cares when this is a game about cars?
After you select your character model from a line of people at the airport, you're in the game. You basically can now drive around and just sight-see or do whatever. You can pull up your map to find race locations, rent or buy new cars with your earnings, and buy another house if you want. Again, if you're hooked up on Live, you can see other players driving around with you. It's a blast to race strangers, set up your own waypoints for races, place bets, etc. You can even find friends and warp to their location. Sometimes I'd be right next to a friend on the map and not see them, but warping to them always fixes that. A minor annoyance, I guess. Without online play, though, this game seems a little bit thin. I honestly don't think you could get more than a week or two's worth of fun out of this. If you ARE online, check it out.
After you select your character model from a line of people at the airport, you're in the game. You basically can now drive around and just sight-see or do whatever. You can pull up your map to find race locations, rent or buy new cars with your earnings, and buy another house if you want. Again, if you're hooked up on Live, you can see other players driving around with you. It's a blast to race strangers, set up your own waypoints for races, place bets, etc. You can even find friends and warp to their location. Sometimes I'd be right next to a friend on the map and not see them, but warping to them always fixes that. A minor annoyance, I guess. Without online play, though, this game seems a little bit thin. I honestly don't think you could get more than a week or two's worth of fun out of this. If you ARE online, check it out.