TrackMania Sunrise

"Easily one of the most overlooked games of 2005."

Trackmania Sunrise is a racing game. You drive through a track and try to get the fastest time on it. Simple. Also, please note that Trackmania Sunrise: Extreme is a free expansion to TMS, downloadable from the official website.

What makes Trackmania special? You can make your own tracks and share them on the web! The online community makes this game great. There are an infinite amount of tracks to play, as they keep churning out of community sites.

OK Let's back up now. There are many modes of play. You can go through the single player mode, which has many different gametypes. There's plain racing, then there's platform mode (which makes the game like a 3D platformer... but driving a car, yeah), then there's puzzle mode (which has you create a track using limited piece, then race it), then there's stunt mode (where you do tricks like flipping and spinning to get points)... And a few more.

Single player mode is long, and hard. And maybe frustrating. Then there's online play. You can easily join an online game when you race other people over the net. The community has tons of events going on that you can participate in, like tournaments and the such, which, along with making your own tracks, makes this game's replay value through the roof.

Gameplay is fantastic. So there's single player and multi player, each with many modes of play. Graphics are quite nice as well. Very detailed graphics. And the lighting is fantastic. You can be racing during sunrise, day, sunset, or at night. Great lighting. Also, the tracks' environment is quite nice. Water, buildings, road signs, trees, etc, can all be places when you design your own tracks.

Sound isn't too great. The music get boring quickly, but you can always play your own mp3s while in game. The sound effects consist of mostly just engine revving. And that's pretty much it. Boring.

Controls are very simple and precise. Arrow keys to drive, Enter key to return to last checkpoint, and that's it. Oh, and some more for camera controls (but you won't really be touching these). You can also use a joystick/gamepad/steering wheel as well, so whatever you want. Controls are tight and responsive.

Very good game. Online community is very nice and adds a ton of gameplay to the game. So does the free expansion Trackmania Sunrise Extreme.

9/10

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 01/20/06