Test Drive Unlimited

"The best bargain title for the 360 yet"

I hate the Test Drive series. The time limits always annoyed me and I could never figure out why if I was in 1st place and ran out of time how I would lose since everyone should run out of time at the same time, unless they are ahead of you. The logic behind the series always annoyed me. I rented Test Drive Unlimited and first let me say it's a "bargain" title for the 360 that has a $40 price tag and it's worth every penny. Think of Test Drive Unlimited as a MMO racing game and it's sweet.

While Test Drive Unlimited doesn't have the graphics that the 360 could normally do, once you see how huge the world is you can forgive the average graphics. The island is laid out exactly like its real life counterpart and it seriously takes many hours to travel every road. The game doesn't load areas or anything; it's all a smooth transition. Even races and stuff don't load. It's amazing. The game offers a ton of cars and houses to buy. Everything is different and you can even dress up your character. It's mind blowing the details that have gone into this game.

Sound wise I don't know what I think. The music is pretty good but I have no idea who the bands are. I also played a number of hours and kept wondering why there wasn't any music. Not realizing I had to turn the radio on.... The car sound effects are nice; I didn't notice any police sirens when they are chasing you. The headset works nicely with the game. You can hear players all around you. It's really interesting to be driving and her two people talking to each other as they pass you.

The only real fault this game has is its control. It's not terrible but it's very loose and I ran into many problems where I either couldn't get back on the road or my car kept doing donuts. My other problem came in the fact that I couldn't always go into reverse. I like the fact that you need to start the car to do anything and shift into R and then hold R to reverse (R as in the reverse button, not the R trigger). Besides those minor things it controls pretty good.

Throw everything you know about racing games out the window. Test Drive Unlimited is what a real racing game should be, well almost. Welcome to Hawaii, you're on the states largest island and by on it I mean you have the entire island to race on. I'm not sure of how big it is but it's very large and has zero loading when it comes to racing around. It's frowned upon to go off the roads but mountains and what not stop that. Races, timed stuff, chores, houses, and car dealerships are all over the island and you just need to get near one and hit the A button to enter it, wait a few seconds for it to load and you're set. If you're connected to LIVE it's always on and those online matches work the same way.

My first recommendation in the game is to make your way to most of the early races. By the time you finish those you should have enough to upgrade your car to the next level. Now you will want to ignore some races while covering a good portion of the island. Why? It's because you can access any spot on any road you've been on via the map. This makes hooking up online and getting from place to place a lot easier. You could always play more races and really up your car up to a fast one and cover ground a lot faster but it's all up to you. When first starting you need to think of Test Drive Unlimited as a mass multiplayer online racing game and that's because that is exactly what is.

The game offers something like 100+ cars and a number of houses. Most car types are here and they all very in stats and handling. Handling is perhaps the only flaw in the game, the game feels like a serious title but the handling is more of an arcade racers. Not a bad thing but it does take a while to get the hang of it.

The online portion is great as well and you can see all active users in the game and any races that are available to join, they are the orange ones on the map. It's so simple to hop into a race and the game uses full mic support but think of it all as open airways. Two friends go racing by you and you can hear them chatting it up. It's just fun and I think that's what made this game so good to me.

The game is long and while it does have achievements, they are actually good and you get them by doing normal stuff in the game. Collecting houses, traveling every road, buying cars and all of that. It's the way achievements should work, not for doing absurd stuff like logging in 10 hours straight of a game, that's just stupid. The online is the best so far and right up there with Chromehounds.

Even without LIVE I would highly recommend this title. It isn't the hardest game to play but it offers a good enough challenge. The game is also a bargain title at $40 and worth every penny. I rarely say that but this game is one of the best on the Xbox 360 thus far. Great online, solid single player and lots to get. If you're really not sure about the game it makes an excellent rental but I doubt if you'll complete all 150 challenges and stuff during a rental.

Story - N/A
Graphics - 8/10
Sound - 8/10
Control - 8/10
Game Play - 9/10
Replay value - 10/10

Final Score - 9/10

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 10/24/06