Review
Release Date: 09.07.2004
Platform:
XboxDeveloper:
Criterion StudiosPublisher:
Electronic ArtsReviewed by
Josh Freund on 9.18.2004
| Review Rating: 10/10 | User Rating: 8.33/10 |
The
Burnout series has always set itself apart from other racing games by requiring you to drive dangerously in order to do well. No risk = no reward. What has also set it apart is the awesome crashes.
Burnout 2 even had a separate game mode totally dedicated to crashing.
Burnout 3 takes the racing and crashing formula that's made the past games successful and adds some new features and a whole lot more mayhem to make one heck of a game. It's easily the best arcade racer I've ever played, and one of the best racing games of all time.
Racing in
Burnout 3 requires driving close to other cars, turning into oncoming traffic, drifting around turns, and performing other risky maneuvers in order to do well and earn Burnout points (which, in turn, unlock things and fill up your boost meter). This means you'll want to drive dangerously for most of the race in order to keep your boost meter filled. Unlike in
Burnout 2, the boost meter in
Burnout 3 can be used even if it's not filled up all the way, which is a nice change.
Burnout 3 gives you a great sense of speed, especially when you're driving the faster-rated cars in the game. It can be hard to read the upcoming turns and see other cars coming, but that's part of what makes it fun. After racing at high speeds for awhile, you should get used to it, at least enough to medal.
Burnout 3's main mode is called "World Tour." In World Tour, you "travel" across the world, competing in events in North America, Europe, and The Far East. A map functions as the main hub from which you select the event you'll take part in. There are eight different event types in World Tour: Race, Grand Prix, Faceoff, Special Event, Preview Lap, Eliminator, Road Rage, and Crash.
Race events are pretty self-explanatory. You race five other racers, and the goal is obviously to finish first. Grand Prix events are just three races in a row. Points are awarded depending on where you place after each race, and the driver with the most points at the end of the GP wins.
Faceoff events are just like Race events, except it's just you against one other car. If you win, you unlock that car. These, like most of the events, get harder as the game goes on and you progress to the faster cars.
Special Event and Preview Lap events are basically one-lap races against the clock, requiring you to beat a certain time in order to medal. These get really hard as you get farther in the game, eventually requiring you to zoom through the track using insanely fast cars without crashing once in order to get a gold medal. They're all possible, but some will require a number of retries, which could frustrate you if you don't like doing the same thing over and over again.
Eliminator events are like races, except whoever is in last place at the end of each lap gets eliminated (their car actually blows up, which is pretty cool).
Now, my 2nd-favorite event – Road Rage. Road Rage events aren't races; rather, the goal is to perform as many takedowns as you can on your opponents before your car gets destroyed or before the timer runs out (whichever happens first). A takedown simply means you caused your opponent to crash. You can do this by smashing into him, getting an aftertouch takedown (explained later), or even psyching him out by driving close to him. Your opponents are trying to take you down as well, so you have to be careful and drive wisely. The road is automatically filled with plenty of cars for you to take down, so you don't have to worry about running out of opponents and not being able to find any. When you takedown an opponent's car, the game will go into a sort of bullet time effect called "impact time," and show the car/s you took down crashing. Smashing into the side of a car, causing it to slam right into another car and having both of them smack head-on into a pillar is a truly beautiful thing.
My favorite event in
Burnout 2 was Crash Mode, and not surprisingly, the Crash events are my favorite events in
Burnout 3. Crashing is what the Burnout series is most known for, and there's good reason for that. The crashes are beautiful- amazingly beautiful. The sole purpose of crash mode is to create the biggest, most expensive crash you can. The real fun in this comes not by driving your car into a random vehicle, but in the strategic placement of your car. Should I smash into the side of the bus, hoping to knock it into the next lane, or should I drive off the ramp, land on top of the tanker, and create a huge explosion? You'll spend a lot of time facing fun dilemmas like this as you play, and you'll keep coming back for more of these awesome crashes.
Burnout 3 has a whopping 100 crash junctions, which is over three times as many as
Burnout 2 had, so it's safe to say you'll be spending a lot of time with them.
A great new feature in
Burnout 3 is the aftertouch system. Once you crash, get airborne off a ramp, or run into/create an explosion, you can slow down time by holding down the A button. Then, you can change the direction your car moves by using the analog stick and actually steer it into other bonuses or cars to create an even bigger crash. This works the same way in races too; you can use it to get "aftertouch takedowns" by crashing into other racers.
The new money bonuses, multipliers, and crashbreakers are a nice addition to the game. It adds more strategy when you're trying to not only create a great crash, but also hit the x4 multiplier and make an explosion or two along the way. Also, you can explode your car once with the press of a button after a certain amount of cars crash or by running into a crashbreaker, thus allowing you to use aftertouch to get a pickup you missed or just cause more damage.
In addition to World Tour, a number of the events can be played as single events outside of World Tour. You can choose where you drive, what car you drive, how many laps, etc., which you can't do in World Tour mode.
Most of the game modes can be played multiplayer, including Crash mode. There are a couple new ways to play crash junctions with a buddy in
Burnout 3. In one, you work together to cause the most damage you can, and your scores are added up. In the other, you compete against each other to see who can cause the most damage. Both, like the single-player crash mode, are a lot of fun, and are welcome additions to the series.
If you have Xbox Live, you can play
Burnout 3 online. Most of the main game modes can be played online - race-type events can support up to six players and Party Crash up to eight. Party Crash is just like the regular Crash mode, except all players' scores are shown on a leaderboard, and whoever causes the most damage wins. Road Rage online can be played with up to six players, and there's a neat twist to it. The red team members chase the blue team members, who are trying to finish without being taken out. It's a lot of fun, as are the other online game modes.
There are a large number of online options you can set (which type of game to play, which cars to use, which lobby you want to play in, etc.), and the menus are really easy to navigate. Unfortunately, many players (including myself) have been complaining about EA's servers. If you play online for an hour, you're likely to get a few "There was a problem updating rankings" messages and you may get disconnected once or twice. Still, it's not too bad, and playing online is a lot of fun, so it's really not a big deal.
Now, as I said at the beginning,
Burnout 3 isn't perfect. There are some problems with the game, though they're not major ones.
This is a matter of personal preference, but I think they killed the audio portion with all the licensed rock/emo/punk music and the annoying DJ isn't needed. I wish they had stuck with the same kind of music that was in
Burnout 2; the guitar-driven rock and electronic music fit the game better. But, I'm just a stickler when it comes to game music, and you can turn the music/dj down or off if you don't like them, so it's not a big deal. Plus, you can create custom soundtracks if you don't like the music, which is what I did.
Another complaint of mine is that during crashes, many times, the camera angle doesn't let you see what you need to in order to use the aftertouch to steer your car into more cars/bonuses. Allowing you to rotate the camera manually (perhaps by using the right analog) would have helped a lot. While this won't keep you from winning races or getting golds in the crash junctions, it's still annoying.
Also, being able to save replays would have been nice, but unfortunately, that feature wasn't included.
Keep in mind that these are all really minor problems, and for a game as fun as
Burnout 3 is, they don't take away from the game experience that much.
In conclusion,
Burnout 3 is truly a fantastic game. In my opinion, the Crash events alone would be worth the $50 it costs. There are a huge amount of cars, awards, events, locations, etc. to unlock. The graphics and sound are superb, and the amount of detail is amazing. I could go on and on.
If you like racing,
buy this game now. If you don't like racing, I recommend at least renting
Burnout 3 and giving it a try. You might like this style of racing, and if not, you can always have fun creating huge crashes.
