Sometimes, you just have to hang on for the ride, praying that you have the green light.īurnout 3 introduced the first in its series to over-competitive battle racing. This motion effect gives the game a fantastic sense of speed, but can severely limit one's ability to see oncoming obstacles, especially if your reaction time is more than 10 milliseconds. It will allow you to shunt recovering competitor in the rear bumperīut you aren't considering this when you stomp your boost button and watch the game world blur like a Star Wars hyperdrive. The Burnout 3 universe is ruled by strange physics. By comparison, all other strategies are academic. Actually, the most important thing about these races is to avoid striking any non-competitive vehicle or environmental feature.

You can also get boost rewards for driving against traffic and narrowly avoiding accidents.īut all this talk of gameplay might lead one to think that this game has some sort of dreaded strategic element. The point is elementary: bash your car into the competition, get rewarded with boost, use boost, rinse, repeat. There are no handbrake functions or shifting setups. The controls are sparsely simple: steering, gas, brake and boost.

This is Everyman's rape, ruin and run rally. The sunlight plays off shiny fenders, illuminating every inch of cracked glass and scraped paint exacted from kissing the concrete. Sparks gush from the sides of dueling vehicles in awe-inspiring arcs, and flames belch from wrecks as if the vehicles had cabins full of gasoline. Immaculately rendered scenes of an amalgamation of towns in the U.S., Europe and Asia wait patiently to be appreciated by losers who smash spectacularly into their detailed street signs and intricate brickwork. After basketball, football and hockey were boiled down to their flashiest, most violent elements, it was only a matter of time before the Jam/Blitz phenomenon hit the racing game genre.īurnout 3: Takedown is the apex of what visceral sports gaming should be pretty, uncomplicated, fast and brutal.

Burnout 3 takedown xbox cover