Burnout Paradise doesn't suck

So I started playing Burnout Paradise a few days ago and let me tell you - it doesn't suck like I expected it to. I recently did a preview of this game on world Asplodes and I trashed it pretty badly.

Some of my inspired quotes at the time:

"You have to guess the way to go in the races."

"Showtime is so ******* stupid that I'm just going to link a video. Be warned though, watching will lower IQ"

"Skip on this ******* trainwreck and get something else instead."

...or something like that...

That's the problem of judging a game before it actually comes out.. You don't really get a feel for the thing and it basically comes down to some out-of-your-ass pulling (a.k.a. guessing) and sheer fanboy outrage for something that's changed but not at all lost.

You see, Burnout for me is THE racing game. It's something I truly love playing. With past installments I took the controller and played for hours on end. When you love something that much you fear change. Especially in a videogame. When I heard of the changes, I went mental. How COULD they work??

Well some of it works and some of it doesn't, but I'll get to that later. Bottomline, this IS worth the money. It's certainly very different and some more hardcore fans may reject it entirely on account of what's not there or is there but different.

I must say that when I actually started playing it did not feel right at all. In Burnout Paradise, at the very start you'll notice a difference. There are no menus of any kind and the moment you press start on the title screen, you're immediately dropped off in the middle of a giant city, not knowing where to go or what exactly is your purpose there. And herein lies the biggest change in focus. For better or worse, progress in the single player mode isn't structured in any way. You have the city as a giant playground with traffic, ramps, speed zones, billboards and fences to break, you name it.

In the intersections you have traffic lights. Should you CHOOSE to do so, you can enter events by stopping at these traffic lights and pressing the accelerator and brake buttons at the same time. Events give you points to advance in license class, which in turn will give you access to better cars. But don't be fooled. This progression is completely optional. You have the entire city open from the start, along with everything you need to have stupid, pure fun and the game asks for nothing in return.

Because of the way the events are designed, you will have to know the streets of this city to succeed. The races are basically "race from point A to point B" and it's up to you how to get there. The game tries to help you by telling you which way to turn in order to find the quickest route, but this simply does not work properly. Next thing you know you'll be last place in a race and going the wrong way if you rely on this system.

The dodgy navigation system also takes you through routes that are often not the way the cpu cars are going. You'll mostly be away from the pack, so the sheer fun of taking down your rivals isn't here as it was supposed to. The easy way to win races is to check your map often enough and this is where the developers tripped over their own game design. Not only is this type of race against everything the fans expect from the series - drive fast, know your way, don't crash - it's also against everything the series is about - drive fast, don't take your eyes off the road. Also, you can't restart the races if you lose, unless you drive to the starting line all over again.

These gripes might mean a no sale to some fans and I must admit that I really hated how frustrating it all was until it hit me. This isn't a structured game. You play it the way you like and the way you want to and that means only do the types of events you enjoy and just forget about the ones you don't. It's really that easy. Also, when you advance a license class, all the events that were already done are wiped clean and you can do them again. You just have to remember that the game is not structured like the previous ones, and there's no need to complete all the events to advance to the next stage. There isn't even a next stage. You are on the first and last stage from the start and it is completely open for you to explore and wreak havoc in anyway you want. It's also very, very beautiful.

About showtime

So yeah, it does look stupid and it's by no means a worthy replacement for the crash mode. What it is is a lot of fun regardless.

So basically this game asks it's fans to change the way they see progression in a Burnout title so they can have fun. While this may seem like too much to ask from a fan that's used to the same structure since the first game came out, it's definitely worth it. Go play it.

Tech Lust for the Handheld Minded

Late last month, as a result of some Christmas offers(€_€)and because my aging GBAs graphics and game release schedule don't seem so impressive as of late, I decided it was time to get me a new handheld system. At first I was a bit divided between three pieces of hardware, all great machines, mind. This triangle was composed of the Nintendo DS, Sony PlayStation Portable and Gamepark Holdings GP2X-F200.

These are all very different machines, with different focuses, albeit similar price points. Here's what your considerations should be if you're undecided, like I was.


First, let's talk about the NDS. The available model on sale right now is the slim model. An attractive clamshell design with two screens, one of which tactile. The DS focuses on games. It has every franchise known to man and its appeal in this field is unquestionable. Everyone and their mother is developing for the DS right now. Plus, it has all the exclusives you would expect from a Nintendo handheld, like Mario games and Zelda. Also, battery life is very impressive.

The downside to the NDS is its hardware. While capable of providing a 3D experience, it's extremely rough around the edges... Think Nintendo 64 with better textures and you get an idea of what to expect. Some games were even ported from the N64 for the NDS. In terms of multimedia functions it's also pretty weak. This is a machine built only for commercial games, and it shows. The extras are all kept to a bare minimum.

There is a homebrew scene for the DS, but with such limited hardware, the results are hardly worth mentioning.

On the complete opposite side of the spectrum, there's the GP2X. This was built specifically as a homebrew-enabled machine. It has Linux as its OS, so it pretty much runs anything you want it to in terms of multimedia. It also has a very active developer community, constantly coming up with both new applications and entertainment content. What I mean by entertainment content is both games and emulators. The amount of emulators is just staggering. There's one for everything. Even arcade systems like the NeoGeo. Because of this, the sheer amount of content (read games) is huge. The downside to it being an open system? No commercial games. Yes, the GP2X has NO commercial games.

In terms of the hardware itself, it sports a big tactile screen in the F200 version. Also, the D-pad is no longer an analog nub like in previous versions, but a REAL d-pad, making it easier to play games requiring complicated motions like Street Fighter 2. One downside of the GPX2 is that it seems to have something of an oddball architecture on the components side that prevents the developers from breaking free of some bottlenecks. But what absolutely kills this machine in my opinion is the fact that it still requires AA batteries to work. This is completely ridiculous for this day and age and there are reports of it depleting the batteries in 30 minutes.

The middleground here is the Sony PSP. The model on sale now is the very attractive PSP-2000, AKA PSP slim and lite. It's just a beautiful machine. It has a huge lcd screen and the recognizable square, triangle, X and circle face buttons. The screen itself isn't touch sensitive but to make up for this, the PSP has a normal D-pad AND an analog nub, so I guess it's ok. This is marketed as a multimedia machine, and understandably so. You can watch movies, listen to music and store your pictures in this.

The hardware is pretty powerful, as it's essentially a modified ps2 in a small case. One look at games like God Of War Chains of Olympus or Wipeout Pulse will make you wonder how this can be achievable on a handheld system. Very impressive. This comes at a cost, however. The battery won't last long. Maybe 5 hours of gameplay time. It's the only real disadvantage of the system.

There's also the CFW, or Custom Firmware. The psp is sold as a closed system. This means that out of the box, you don't have access to homebrew applications or games since the official firmware locks the system to these types of programs. Things get interesting if you install Custom Firmware. This opens up a whole new world of possibilities for your machine. Since the PSP has a small but pretty active community of coders, it has a huge library of homebrew applications, games and emulators. You get access to features like watching youtube videos through wifi, drawing programs, security programs, file explorers, you name it. And you still get genesis, sega cd, snes, psone, neogeo, cps1, cps2 and even n64 emulators on the go.

The Veredict

I finally decided to get a PSP. It's hands down the most complete of the 3 machines. While this isn't the case right out of the box, it can easily be achived through some simple (yet somewhat risky) firmware updates. It completely balances the the homebrew side and the commercial side of entertainment. I love it for it.