![]() There's a case to be made for the cleverness of the multiplayer too, which shuns a traditional lobby-based system for something altogether more personal. A minimal HUD consisting of just a speedometer ensures you're given an unobstructed view of the city finer details like position, lap times, and score are cleverly overlaid onto the environment itself. Performance is good too, even on modest systems, but there's a disappointing lack of graphics options-you have to rely on your graphics card drivers for any tweaks you want to make. The outer city brings with it highways and tight tunnels for close-quarters shunting, while the addition of nighttime races adds more beauty to the already finely crafted and detailed tracks. The dusty, crate-filled roads and tight turns of the Docks area soon give way to the towering concrete skyscrapers of the inner city, with drift-friendly roads, explosive trucks, and mesmerizing jumps making them a joy to race through. They include Domination races that reward destruction, Shindo races that reward pure racing skill, Drift Attacks that reward your ability to go sideways, and Frag Attacks that reward smashing your opponents into a wall.ĭistricts you unlock give each event a new lease on life, such is their variety. Even if you don't take a podium place during an event-though there is a bonus for doing so-your time on the circuit isn't wasted: the points you earn from destruction go towards increasing your overall racing level, which opens up new districts (tracks) in Shatter Bay, new cars, and new events. For every car you wreck, building you destroy, or lamppost you topple, there are points to be won. Such displays of destruction are not only a treat for the eyes, but a key to your success. Buildings that stand in the way of a straight path down the track are ripe for your boosts too, exploding with a vigour that propels you out the other side in a display of broken glass and rubble that would be worthy of any great action movie. Competitors can be turned into twisted heaps of metal with a well-timed boost to the rear, resulting in spectacular-if overly long-slow-motion wipeouts of flame and shrapnel. The boost bar that fills during drifts isn't just for bursts of speed it's your primary weapon of destruction. This makes them more challenging, but the rewards for such skilful manoeuvres are greater than before. ![]() ![]() Put simply, you can't coast through drifts anymore. Undercook it, and you won't even make it around the bend. ![]() Overdo the steering, and you slam straight into a wall. Drifting still plays its part, but gone is the on-rails feel of old, replaced with a much more dynamic and exciting system that rewards careful timing of the hand brake and judicious tweaks of the steering to make it around corners. Their handling is a blend of old and new too. All have a unique look that mimics real-world classics, yet they retain the pseudo-futuristic style that Ridge Racer is famed for. You can pick from all manner of machines, some faster and lighter, others stronger and better in the drift. Your cars are varied, plentiful, and oh so shiny. But it's thrown together with a great deal of care. It's easy to see where Unbounded's influences lie: the crumbling cityscapes are lifted from MotorStorm: Apocalypse and Split/Second the slow-motion takedowns are those of Burnout and the fast-paced multiplayer action is akin to Blur's. ![]()
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