Street Racing Syndicate

"Nice, but could be better."

This is my first review, so I'll try to be as informative as possible. For anyone that wants a drifting game, just go to Kaido Battle 2 as this doesn't even compare after playing Kaido. The premise of the game is to start from the bottom and race to get cash, respect, and of course girls. Although is sounds good, it falls short of a great street racing game.

Controls - 9/10

I do like how the game is geared towards sim handling but the drifting just bad, not as bad as NFSU but bad. It could be that I got spoiled with Kaido Battle, but it just not that good to me. There is talk about the clutch in the game but I don't know which button it is because I'm an idiot but it a sounds like a good addition. The sim handling is not as extreme as GT but it's a good balance between sim and arcade. And like many racing games for the PS2 the controls are simple hence the reason why I got it for the PS2 and my GT4 steering wheel.

Graphics - 7/10

The graphics are good but not that great. You can see objects clearly and looks nice but could be better. They did do a good job on textures as the road is very detailed and there are many details on the cars but the game gives off too much of a NFSU vibe (not good seeing as NFSU is a bad game). But the damage looks great and I like how you have to repair your car as well. I heard a lot about the lack of "sense of speed" but that's pointless and I like how SRS looks at high speeds. Although you hardcore NFSU fans would rant about that but you like NFSU...

Sound - 9/10

The sound FX is great, the cars sound like they're supposed to, but what keeps this from a 10 is that the music is ok. You can actually tell the difference from a H4 from a rotary engine, which is nice. There isn't much else as this is good enough for me.

Gameplay - 7/10

This is what matters the most of any game and is the reason why I gave the game the rating. The game does do a nice job on the city, with it's free roam or just jump to where ever you want. This game does have different types of racing like crew meets, street races, sanction events, roll up races, and respect events. But this game gets too repetitive at times, where I just zone out. You could say all racing games are repetitive but this feels a bit like NFSU. What is good is the tuning, you can tune many different components of the engine, suspension, and what not. I also like the fact that you can dyno the car, even though it automatically dynos when you fit aftermarket parts. The big downfall is just like NFSU.....you can't adjust any settings. The dyno is nice because you see your powerband but you can't adjust the gear ratios to get the perfect adjustments. One of the reasons why this game is not that great as this is supposed to be a more realistic racing game. I was expecting fine tuning like GT, TXR, or Kaido Battle, but this is aright. You also can't see the weight of the cars even though you can lower the weight. Another plus with this game is the Girls of course. I can't find a negative with that as anyone in the import scene knows who's who.

In conclusion, this game could have been a great street racing game but falls short but it is a solid street racing game. If you're wondering if you should get this, NFSU2, Juiced, or Midnight Club 3 I'll break it down for you.
NFSU2 - If you liked Fast and the Furious and 2F2F and know little to nothing about cars, it's for you.
Juiced - It's cancelled so there you go and I played the demo it wasn't good either.
Midnight Club 3 - If you liked the series then get it but looks bad to me.
Out of all of the street racing games I have played TXR series and Kaido Battle series are the best to date.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 09/03/04