Burnout 3: Takedown

"A true racing game"

A lot of racing games were not a fun as I thought they would be each time I tried them over the years. Some do have a sense of speed, but they fail to show it. Some racing games were as fun as others... but not this one. "Burnout 3: Takedown", Electronic Arts' newest racer (since acquired from the now-dead Acclaim Entertainment) developed by Criterion is best defined the greatest racing game in the entire planet! This game truly has shown a sense of speed that no other game has gotten correct. I was really amazed by this craftsmanship of this title.

Graphics - 10/10

The graphics are really beautiful from start to finish. The cars look incredibly detailed and shiny (SO shiny that even I could see my reflection!). Too bad that they are not real cars, but nobody would care. The environments are extremely detailed as well. You can catch a glimpse of the sun and the clouds. The buildings and the mountain are all beautiful. Even the junk off the cars when they collide is also very well done. I also like the motion blur when you ride at really quick speeds of up to 200 mph. That was really impressive.

Audio - 9/10

I like the music they put on there. They got real rock bands such as Finger Eleven, Jimmy Eat World, Franz Ferdinand and many others. As for the sounds of driving, they are so realistic! You can hear the squealing of the tires, the bass heavy whoosh of the boost, and the grinding of the metal when two cars battle it out. The DJ in this game working on "Crash FM" can be annoying, but I did not mind the annoyance at all.

Controls - 10/10

This racing game has very simple and very responsive controls. You can do a lot in this game. When you crash, you can drop the game into slow motion (called Impact Time) and witness the true realism of the crash. You can also make a light adjustment to your wreck (formerly known as your ride) with your left analog stick. This is called "Aftertouch". You can use it to slam into other unsuspecting cars and tankers as well as your rivals in a race. That is a very cool addition they have added.

What they have also added is the "Crashbreaker" effect at the crash junctions. On your command, you can blow up your trashy ride and Aftertouch into any pickups you missed or other cars you want to destroy.

Gameplay - 10/10

What can I say about gameplay? It is fantastic. There is a career mode that contains a whole lot of races and crash junctions. The career mode includes plain old races, road rage events where you must take down a number of foes before time runs out or your car is dead, eliminator races where whoever is in last place is done, and so on. There is a lot of things to do around the world from the U.S. to Europe to the Far East.

Driving mechanics are still the same as the previous "Burnout" games. You live dangerously and drive dangerously. You can do that by any means such as driving the wrong lane, getting close to other cars, drifting, catching air and so on. When you pull off such maneuvers, you are rewarded with boost. This can help you gain monentum and catch up to the other racers. Oh... speaking of which, the fastest way to gain boost is to smash the other rivals in the racetrack.

"Takedown" (a cool subtitle for a game like this) is an integral part of "Burnout 3". When you take down a rival, your boost meter is refilled, and it adds an extra segment. If you crash, you will lose a segment of your meter and you may fall back by a lot. If you do crash but manage to takedown a rival using Aftertouch, you will earn an Aftertouch Takedown which will refill your boost meter and will prevent you from losing any extra segments.

Multi-player is also very well done. On a single console, you can have a race, a road rage competition (where the first person to last longer than another or score 10 takedowns wins) or a crash event. Team Crush pits two players co-operatively making a huge wreck. Double Impact sees two people battling it out to destroy a routine traffic junction. Party Crash (which is a mode for up to 8 people, in teams or individually) is a crash battle to determine who made the biggest wreck in a certain number of rounds.

"Burnout 3: Takedown" also has on-line support for the PlayStation 2. The multi-player games remain the same, except for Road Rage. In this online edition of Road Rage, the blue team must reach the finish line before the red team picks them off one by one by means of a takedown. The maximum number of people in a single race track that you can race is six. The statistics are also very well tracked so you can see how well you are doing, compared to the rest of the world. I love the online play in this game. I wish all games would work like this one, online-wise.

Overall - 10/10

So, if you like racing games, this is for you. If you don't like racing games, this is the game to try. I know that you will freak out at this game that you will be insane enough to play for a long time. It will keep you busy as well, even if you don't play it on-line. "Burnout 3: Takedown" is for anyone with a adrenaline rush will probably love.

Pros:

+ Extremely good visuals
+ New mechanics
+ Online play

Cons:

- Annoying DJ

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 02/22/05