FlatOut

"Not a spinoff of BurnOut, but I sure do wish it was (#350)"

I admit I have a sweet tooth for demolition derby games. I liked both of last year's derby racers that hit Xbox: Test Drive: Eve of Destruction and Crash ‘n Burn. It is just something about blowing up your rivals and knocking them out of the competition that gives me an extra sense of accomplishment instead of hatred from fellow gamers when I dare attempt the same feat in more realistic racers like Forza and Project Gotham. This latest derby racer, FlatOut is fairly decent, but lacks elements that made the aforementioned titles a blast to play.

One of my biggest peeves with FlatOut is that you cannot totally destruct fellow rival racers. They do take a heck of a beating and leave a path of vehicle panels and stage obstacles scattered all over the track, but the fact that they can't get retired is a big letdown in my book. I also had some qualms with FlatOut's turbo system. It is loosely based off of the one seen in BurnOut where players were rewarded for risky racing (racing in oncoming traffic, close calls, etc) whereas in here the turbo meter is filled based on running into vehicles and course objects. Granted, it is nice to get a decently filled turbo meter after you get wiped out by someone, but while trying to crush everyone to get that extra boost I found myself steadily falling behind the pack. The system just doesn't work. It really doesn't bone well for the actual racing engine too. The controls are loose enough as it is where I found myself constantly getting hung up on curves and crashing on the slightest of obstacles that should have been more forgiving. I eventually got a decent feel for the racing, but the learning curve for it is simply unacceptable for an arcade racer.

Another down point is the fact that only up to eight vehicles can race on track at once. The races just don't feel the same as the ones that allowed up to 14 in Eve of Destruction and 16 in Crash ‘n Burn. This is especially noticeable in the Demolition Derby events. Usually that is my favorite play mode in derby racers, but it is quite the contrary in FlatOut. The vehicles accumulate way too much damage all too soon and it seemed my ride received more damage than it should have dealt after nailing an opponent with a punishing blow. I thought it was against the rules for a derby racer to screw up the demolition derby mode, but now we sadly have our first offender.

FlatOut does have an interesting gimmick where after suffering a big crash your driver will be ejected from their vehicle and execute some amazing rag doll physics as they get tossed and turned around the tracks. The down part to this is while you watch your driver being tossed about; all the other vehicles will pass you until the several second delay for the respawn button is available. The developers knew they were having some fun with this system and incorporated it into six shockingly fun mini-games you can play with up to three friends. My favorites are the highjump, darts, bowling, and bullsyeye mini-games. Unfortunately passing the controller around in these surprisingly addicting events was the most fun I had in FlatOut.

For a $50 game, I was quite unimpressed with FlatOut's by-the-numbers career mode. It is as simple as it gets, with just three classes to race in. There are minor upgrades that can be made to the vehicles to improve the shocks, horsepower, etc. and a few color schemes to pick for each ride but that is all for car customization. No in-depth pain-job tool, no customization of spoilers and rims, just the bare bones. At least it seems you really have to work to earn the dough to buy a new high powered vehicle for the next class and get a good feeling when it is all yours…..until you discover that all the stellar vehicles that were locked in single-player are unlocked for use for everyone in online multiplayer.

The online is pretty solid overall, although I did run into some bad cases of lag every couple dozen of races. There is a nice point ranking system so you can know how well the competition is you are up against. FlatOut seems to be pretty popular online as my created games get filled up to the max within minutes. It is just too bad it is only the racing that is playable online. There is no online support for the demolition derby events or the awesome rag doll mini-games.

At least the designers went all out on the graphics. Those vehicles getting torn apart sure look pretty. The damage modeling system is one of the best I have ever seen. Hoods and panels fly off, and tires are just barely wobbling on to their hubcaps as they are exposed. The animation is well done too as vehicles kick up plenty of snow and dirt as they glide along the tracks. The many forests, dirt tracks and raceways the vehicles duel in look solid, but it is nothing we haven't seen before. Ditto with the audio effects, save for the mildly-amusing ‘yeaaaaahaaaa' a driver blurts out as they are flying from their vehicle.

The developers must have had some coding problems with the soundtrack because in all the races and events there is just one song that loops over and over and you cannot manually skip it either so you are stuck with that song until you go to a different race. The soundtrack isn't anything to brag home about either, it is a decent mix of alternative and rock, but a good amount of it doesn't mesh well with the gameplay. With so many unknown bands featured (half the songs are from unsigned bands off of overplay.com) I was much ticked to find no support for custom soundtracks.

For $50 I cannot recommend FlatOut to anyone. Aside from some nice looking cars, this game has ‘budget title' written all over it with the complete lack of game types and shallow career mode. The many gripes I had with the game engine and controls don't really help this title out too much either. There is some fun to be had with a decent online function and some great mini-games so you cannot go wrong giving FlatOut a rental. If you really want your derby racer fix on the Xbox that I highly recommend going with Eve of Destruction or Crash ‘n Burn instead.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 09/16/05