NASCAR 06: Total Team Control

"Decent, but could definitely be better"

Nascar '06 is a pretty solid game. You definitely feel like you're in a Nascar atmosphere, even when you're on the Whelen or Craftsman series. It is mostly a whole lot of small, annoying things that will make this game not as fun to play.

Graphics: 9

The graphics for this game are definitely great. The cars look amazing, especially with the new damage modeling. If you just nick the car in front of you, you'd be able to see the little damage it does to your car. Hit the car in front of you over and over again, and eventually your hood could even fall off. The crashes are very realistic. They even make you want to go out of your way to cause a 15-car pileup, laughing at the car behind you who ends up doing corkscrews off the side of the road. One thing that's not as great is when you're in the pit. You still see the damage while the crew is working on it, but right when they finish, everything magically looks perfect. it would be better if they fixed how it looked while they worked on it, or even if something you did to it could not be fixable, and had to look like that for the rest of the race.

Gameplay: 6

The gameplay was disappointing. EA worried too much about the teamwork, and therefore caused the gameplay to suffer. The cars are very hard to control. In one race, you won't be able to turn, and crash into the side wall. The next one, you make a minor adjustment to your car, and you fishtail on every turn. It's very annoying. Once in a while it freezes in the middle or end of a race. Sometimes, it never unfreezes, and you have to restart, but it has happened where you sit there for literally three or four minutes and it unfreezes suddenly.

The Fight to the Top mode could be great if little things were fixed up. There are too many glitches for it to be outstanding. With a certain car, you can play a whole season, but then it won't let you advance past the offseason, and you'll have to start the mode completely over again. Also, if you struggle at the beginning of the year, you're probably in trouble. Many times I've lost a job in the middle of the season, and signed with a new team. Then I'll win my first race, and get top 5 in my second one, and they fire me again for being too low in points standings. You have to succeed from the start for it to be fun.

The rest of the mode is great though. You can buy a team, and modify everything about the car, including sponsors. You hire a driver, and don't have to race that car anymore, or you can not hire a driver, and continue racing yourself.

The team aspect is pretty meh to me. It's not vital to the game, but it seems they spent so much time on it. You can only have 4 of the 10-15 options while you're racing, so the rest are pointless. Even the ones you use, you might use two or three times in a race most, and sometimes they turn you down.

Sound: 7

Also pretty meh. It's not horrible, but not good either. Not much else to tell.

Replay Value: 8

Depending on what you like to do most, there is a lot to do over again. You could do all of the challenges, which are fun, and get challenging. The Fight to the Top Mode could probably played a few times before it starts getting boring.

Overall, I'd give it about a 7/10. It's a fun game if you can get around all the glitches. It has potential to be a 9 or 10 next year if EA fixed it up.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 12/07/05