Project Gotham Racing

"A great arcade style racer for those tired of car sims"

Project Gotham Racing for the X-Box is the sequel to the original Dreamcast game by Bizarre Creations; Metropolis Street Racer. MSR was a long awaited Dreamcast game which went through a series of delays before being finally released to the public in January of 2001. It was an arcade style racing game which put a large emphasis on driving to look good rather than to drive safely. The crazier you drove the better as the points system relied on various drifts and things of that nature. Project Gotham carries this system best known as the “Kudos” to the X-Box and does it quite well.

One thing that should be mentioned before hand because there have been comparisons of this game to Gran Turismo 3 for the Playstation 2. I’d like to state that this game is not the same as GT3. It was intended to be an arcade style game which has no focus on simulation which is what GT3 does have. It is a pure arcade style racer which is meant to be fun.

As one of the first generation X-Box games, it is a great looking game. It boasts a solid and consistent frame rate which is smooth and great to look at. It is not a Gran Turismo 3 so don’t expect it to be that way. It is a completely different game engine which has its own unique look which sets it apart from many other racing games. The tracks in the game are modeled after streets in four major real world cities, New York City, San Francisco, London, and Tokyo. The makers of the game went to these cities to collect data on everything here, ranging from photos to video footage to capture the real look of these places. While I have never been to San Francisco, London, or Tokyo, I can say that New York City looks just as it does in real life. Having been to the financial district on numerous occasions, I found myself recognizing various parts of it in the game. The modeling of the cities is accurate and has high detail. You’ll swear it resembles the actual city. NYC has the various sections from the financial district to Central Park down cold. San Francisco has the Fisherman’s Wharf as well as the hilly streets to careen down. London has you fly over the bridge which goes across the Thames River and past the Big Ben. Tokyo in all its glory captures the cluttered feel of the streets as well as the bright neon signs. These are some of the best tracks visually in a racing game ever. The car models are not too bad. I just think they could have used more detail. It might be asking a lot because of Gran Turismo 3, but Project Gotham’s cars seem to be missing that visual punch. They are accurately modeled after the real life automobiles. All of the small details are there from the “SS” badging on the Camaro Super Sport to the big Brembo brake calipers on the Ferraris’ and Porsches. The cars look absolutely gorgeous as they boast a crystal clear shine upon them. When you brake, the rotors will start to turn an orange-gold color from the heat build up. When the wheels on the cars spin fast enough and they create the illusion that they are clear, you can easily see the rotors and brake calipers. Tire rubber will be left upon the track when you drift around a turn. Something this game has which is missing from most racing games is car damage. When you smash into another car, get hit by a car, slam into a wall, the damage will show up on your car. Headlights will get smashed thus knocking out visibility on night courses. Tail lights will become non-functional if a car hits you from behind. The bumpers will crumple inward from a hard enough impact. In fact by the end of a race depending on how much damage has been inflicted upon the vehicle, it can look almost like an entirely new car. This is a great graphical touch which always fun to see in case you always wanted to wreck a high priced exotic import car. This is a great first generation X-Box game graphically. It really shows what the system is going to be capable of when game developers become more familiar with how to design games on it.

The sound in the game is excellent. All of the cars in this game sound realistic as far as engine noise. The Ferrari F355 sounds just like it does in real life. Nothing is more beautiful than hearing a high winding Ferrari V8 reach a banshee shriek at 8500 RPM’s. Each car has its own unique sounding engine which is welcome because it adds to the feel of driving that particular car. The in game music I find to be better than the prequel for Dreamcast. You are given the option of listening to “Radio Stations” which are in the game. The music featured on them isn’t bad; I have no problems listening to it. However, the best part of the game is the fact that it has the ability to listening to songs of your choice. How do you do that? You simply take a music CD and copy songs you want from it onto the X-Box Hard Drive. From there you can select the songs you want to listen to once you are in the game. For this reason alone, the game is great with the music because you have the freedom to pick your own! Add in the great sounding cars and the sound is impeccable in my eyes.

Controlling the cars in the game is very easy. The control is responsive and it is not faulty. Depending on how the rating of a car’s handling is generally has an effect on how well the car is going to drive no matter how good you are. The triggers act as the accelerator on the right and brakes on the left. The main steering control is the main analog stick. The secondary analog stick also has a function for the car. If you’d rather not use the triggers to accelerate and brake, simply pushing the secondary analog stick will make the car go forward or stop. I didn’t really like using it, but it is always a good option if you don’t like using the triggers. The “A” button acts as your handbrake. The handbrake is great for making those drifts around sharp turns when you need more Kudos points. It is easy to correct your car when it goes into a slide which is something that can be problematic in various other racing games. When you get to the better handling cars such as the F355, 360 Modena, Porsche GT2, and so forth, you really get the feeling of having total control of the car.

The Kudos Challenge is where everything is at. It is here where you will unlock most of the game’s cars and the gameplay is much better in my opinion than Metropolis Street Racer. There are 12 levels of challenge. In each one of these levels there are a certain amount of courses to complete. When a certain amount of Kudos points is gained, you then complete a course in which you will receive Bronze, Silver, or Gold medal depending if you met the minimum requirement. The number of points required to do this varies depending on the current level you are on. For example a level might require you to get 600 Kudos points to get the Bronze medal. When you get a medal the track is completed. But you can go back to attempt to get a higher score. All of the tracks in a level have different tasks to do on them. Some races are just to place in a certain position, such as 1st. You are given the ability to raise the difficulty for a track, the harder the difficulty, the more points you get if you win. Those in addition to any points scored off slides in the game equals your total Kudos points for that track. Other tracks will have you try to complete “X” amount of laps in the given time. You might have to lap cars a certain amount of times. Some tracks require you to attempt to get a certain amount of Kudos by driving through cones setup and sliding your way around. A lot of levels have a One-on-One challenge at the end. You will race against a car and if you finish first, you will add that car to the selectable cars. Some cars are unlocked when you gain a key number of Kudos points overall in the game. To unlock the 550HP V12 Ferrari F50, one must complete the daunting task of getting 150,000 Kudos points total. The game has a good difficulty challenge which increases the higher the levels go. It doesn’t start off easy then all of a sudden gets hard. It progressively gets more challenging as the CPU racers become better. The minimum requirement of Kudos points to complete a track goes up each level which adds to the challenge of driving to get more points but still managing to do everything in the allotted time or placing first in a race. It’s an excellent challenging game which I find to be better than MSR. In fact the overall car selection is so much better. You work your way from cars like the Porsche Boxter or Mercedes Benz SLK Kompressor all the way up to the high horsepower European exotics. A decent assortment of exotics is in the game. You have Ferrari and Porsche. Both of these companies boast some of their best cars ever. Porsche has the infamous 450HP GT2 and the Carrera GT which at this time is yet to go into full production. Ferrari has the F355 in both the coupe and convertible forms. The 360 Modena follows that as well. Then there is the F50 which is one of the greatest cars ever made. America makes a strong showing with the Viper RT/10, Chevrolet Corvette Z06, and the 35th Anniversary Edition Camaro SS. Japanese cars are here as well such as the R-34 V-Spec Skyline which is always a welcome car to a racing game. The gameplay is solid through out and excels over its predecessor.

This game will keep you playing for quite awhile. Completing the Kudos Challenge will take a bit of time to do. But it is fun to play. When you get bored of that mode, as long as you have unlocked the free roam mode, you can drive around the cities with the ability to fully explore the tracks. This is fun to do because you can just burn rubber everywhere and just drive recklessly. I’m still playing this game half a year after I got it and I’m not bored with it yet.

Depending on whether you want a simulation driving game or not makes a difference in whether to buy this or not to. I personally think if you are a big fan of racing games and want a great one to play which offers a lot of replay value this is good to pick up. I like having this because it serves as a good breather from Gran Turismo 3. Sometimes the whole simulation thing gets to be enough and I just want to slide through turns. If you are new to driving games, this is a good rental, although don’t expect to complete it over a weekend. This was an excellent launch game and still holds its value months later. Definitely pick this title up if you like racing games.

Graphics: 9/10
Sound: 10/10
Control: 10/10
Gameplay: 10/10
Replay: 10/10

Overall: 9/10

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 06/20/02, Updated 06/20/02