All things Burnout

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ratsoalbion
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All things Burnout

Post by ratsoalbion »

You know the drill, folks. Please get your thoughts in about Criterion's first couple of Burnouts (PS2/GC/Xbox) from the early 2000s in time for our podcast recording on Friday evening (May 9th 8pm BST).
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Scrustle
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Re: This week's podcast: Burnout and Burnout 2: Point of Imp

Post by Scrustle »

The first two Burnout games are incredibly important games for me, especially the first.

That was the first racing game I ever got in to. A genre which quickly became, and still remains as one of, if not my overall favourite genre. The game was a revelation at the time. The handling felt so tight and responsive, the sense of speed was unlike anything I had seen before. It nailed the feeling of driving so well, which is always the most important part of a racing game. The crashes added an exhilarating tension to races too, but they were also a great feature in their own right. Very spectacular, but also realistic at the same time. Despite the game being a pretty basic arcade style game, it blew my mind back then, and I instantly fell in love with the series.

But I've also been playing both these games again recently, and this first game has aged quite a lot. While the handling is still pretty good, it doesn't feel anywhere near as good as it used to. It can feel a little stiff, and a lot of the cars aren't enjoyable to drive at all. There is hardly any content to the game either. It does almost seem as if the game was designed for an arcade cabinet rather than a console. There aren't really many cars or tracks to unlock, and the game is extremely short. It can be beaten in just a few sittings, or only one if you binge on it. The game also features a relatively strict countdown timer in races, and credits that you use each time you run out of time or lose a race, which both seem kind of redundant now. The game also lacks polish a bit too. The UI is very basic, and not particularly aesthetically pleasing, and the graphics look a little dull and grainy now. Yet despite these problems, the game is still pretty fun. But looking back on it now, it feels very obviously like the first effort from a then-small studio who hadn't really decided what direction they wanted to go in yet. It's still a pretty enjoyable game, but one where every aspect of it has been improved upon many times over the years by its successors.

Burnout 2 is another story though. When that first came out, I was wowed by it all over again. Everything about it was drastically improved and expanded. Cars felt way better to drive, so much so that the driving model of this game still stands out as exemplary for the genre. There were far more cars too, and many more events to take part in, across a much more wide and varied selection of tracks. The game had obviously higher production values to it as well. The UI was far better, everything visually was sharper and more colourful. The game also had a pretty great original soundtrack. It featured really catchy, although admittedly slightly generic rock music, that are real ear-worms. The main theme song for this game has remained firmly stuck in my mind through all these years. Although the game was still generally a straightforward arcade racer, this was the first time a Crash Mode was put in to the games. At this point, it was still fairly basic, but it was a pretty unique feature at the time that was the first real exploration in to the adoration of mangled metal that the series became famous for.

This game has stood the test of time far better than its predecessor. All the improvements over the first are still just as dramatic, and it's even pretty impressive by modern standards too. It still feels really sharp satisfying to play today, and retains a sense of vitality to it that still burns brightly. It's definitely a classic that deserves more than to be obscured in the shadow of Burnout 3, as good as that game is as well.
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Re: This week's podcast: Burnout and Burnout 2: Point of Imp

Post by Flabyo »

One of my friends from university liked Burnout 2 enough to pick up a PS2 steering wheel for it. Lacking any decent height table to clamp the thing to, he resorted to using his ironing board. Ironing boards however aren't built for the kind of aggressive steering the Burnout games need and so it collapsed on more than one occasion...

I'm one of those that prefers the more relaxed and less punishing gameplay of Burnout 3 and Burnout Paradise, but there's no denying the tension of the early Burnout games, and how sometimes you'd just find yourself slipping into a trance like state in which you were unbeatable.
suzzopher

Re: This week's podcast: Burnout and Burnout 2: Point of Imp

Post by suzzopher »

The first game was a complete surprise. I wasn't expecting anything from it, coming from Acclaim you tend to expect the worst but Criterion delivered a fine arcade racer. It hit at the right time too, with The Fast & the Furious riding high in the cinema, racing games were the in thing.

Burnout 2 is a massive improvement though. Crash mode is one of the finest modes in any game of that era. How the hell did someone think 'Let's make an arcade racing/puzzle game'? It works though, the hours I spent trying to get the best scores, working out the right point of impact to get those high scores was pure genius.

Do you guys remember the controversy with the ad campaigns for Burnout 2? I seem to remember a print ad was leaked ahead of the official advertising of the most famous crashes of all time, then Accalim even said that they would pay speeding fines for those who purchased the game on launch day!
Baron Phil

Re: This week's podcast: Burnout and Burnout 2: Point of Imp

Post by Baron Phil »

The original Burnout was a complete impulse buy for me purely because I had money to spend and wanted a game. I spotted it on the shelf and as an arcade racer fan, took a chance and I'm so glad I did as it blew me away.

It came out when I was 20 when me and my friends would spend all our free time drinking and gaming at a friends flat. I remember taking it around my friends house to show them all and everyone was sat flinching at every near miss as I drove headlong into oncoming traffic. At that time non of my gaming friends were racing game fans but all 5 who were there that day picked the game up and when Burnout 2 came out it was a big event for us all.

The introduction of Crash mode was a welcome addition with everyone learning from each other's run and finding new ways to rack up huge scores. Pursuit mode was also great fun and we set our own rules and always played white Japanese Muscle vs black SUV.
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delb2k
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Re: This week's podcast: Burnout and Burnout 2: Point of Imp

Post by delb2k »

Burnout 1 felt like a proof of concept to me, a chance for Criterion to test out their Renderware engine on the back of an interesting premise. The seeds of adrenaline fuelled risk racing were present in a slimmed down package that at times was too punitive for it's own good leading to lots of restarts which became particularly aggregious when the final, longer races came in. But all the hints were there, they just needed to find a way to hook them all together into a perfect storm.

And that perfect storm is Burnout 2. The most important tweak they made was to make small revisions to the risk and reward balance leading to courses where you could continually burnout for all three laps after the first one is kicked off. This is where the game shined, where you as the driver pushed yourself to find the most beneficial route without crashing. It continually teased possibility in your face and dared you to take that last risk, move away at that last second and rewarded you with a kick of adrenaline. It forced you to always concentrate, always be fearful of what was around the next corner because contact of any nature was still fatal. It is the only arcade racer that requires both precision and skill all the time that I can remember.

The course design was also fantastic, the course based on what looked to be a mixture of seafront and inner city being a particular highlight of lane and intersection dodging. The cars were much better modelled and felt far more statisfying to drive taking aspects of both drifting and 4WD to heart to cater for all styles while crash junction was the realisation that actually it can be fun to cause a little mayhem.

Of all the Burnout games Burnout 2 is the purest. It does not put the player in kid gloves and demands total precision throughout. Anything that moves is possibly deadly and as a test of skill it is the Burnout game that requires complete dedication. Later ones relaxed the collision rules and allowed rear ending of traffic which for me lost some of the magic and skill of what made the series as much fun as it was. I really enjoyed this racer, and for me only PGR is the series that comes close or equals Burnout in terms of arcade racing.
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Re: This week's podcast: Burnout and Burnout 2: Point of Imp

Post by RoboticMonk3y »

For me, Burnout 2 is the perfect arcade racer, featuring over stylised vehicles, a good selection of races and just felt fast, Junction mode was great fun too, trying to work out the best way to cause the biggest pile up of traffic chaos.

While racing, I liked the risk reward balance of driving aggressively and swerving near oncoming traffic to build up boost vs playing it safe and avoiding a crash. Holding down the boost button beefed up the soundtrack, which seemed to make boosting all the more pleasing.

Later on in the game pulling off a drift through a section of corners and coming out clean felt genuinely satisfying, and something I've not found in a racing game since.

Genuine arcade racing loveliness.
CoffeeJezus

Re: All things Burnout

Post by CoffeeJezus »

Burnout 1 and 2 ...

Burnout, I recall, perhaps incorrectly, as a Gamecube launch title - and am pretty sure it was in the massive bags I walked away with from Another World [much missed games & comics shop].

I was a big arcade racing fan as a blighter, mesmerised by the sheer spectacle of the likes of Outrun and Chase HQ in those stolen weeks of caravan holidays up in Skegness, knowing that such games would never make it intact to Commodore's shoebox of glory.

I skipped a few console generations thereafter, obsessing over and making music in the meantime and fell away from gaming. Even dipping my toe into the waters of PSone, racing wasn't a priority. Just one of those things I either forgot about, or didn't fancy playing in the light of swish adventures shooting zombies or raiding tombs.

Yet those old school adorations were most definitely in mind for those début moments of Gamecube - a console which went on to become my favourite ever. I ploughed hours into Burnout, and became rather good at it.

A friend would come over and we'd play co-op together - and more often than they would end up beaten. Funny memory being that he was a policeman, and shared the amount of times he'd get into a chase in the real world, and his instinct was to go on the wrong side of the road to build boost. That's how much we played it.


By Burnout 2 I was playing on Xbox, and, while skirting purely on memories at this point, I recall thinking this was as close to the purity of the arcades of my youth as I could have ever hoped. I adored the designs of the tracks, the sheer feeling of speed [which may well seem a bit laughable in the modern day] and, once again ploughed so, so much time into it.

Easily the most I've obsessed I've ever been over a console racer - an adorations which continued into 3 [Xbox], then Revenge [360], but died utterly with Paradise, which I hated. But those are stories for another podcast and another time ;)


It's been so long since I played these, and the podcast has instilled a desire to play Burnout 2 again particularly, but I can't seem to find the disc. Although i'm beginning to wonder if it's actually in the Xbox itself! Time to get it [and The Duke!] down from atop the wardrobe :)
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Re: Our next podcast recording: Burnout 3 and Burnout Reveng

Post by ratsoalbion »

OK, folks - you have until next Sunday afternoon (BST) 8th June to get your thoughts in on Burnout 3: Takedown and Burnout Revenge.
Feel free to also chip in with any Legends/Dominator impressions too.
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RoboticMonk3y
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Re: Our next podcast recording: Burnout 3 and Burnout Reveng

Post by RoboticMonk3y »

ratsoalbion wrote:OK, folks - you have until next Sunday afternoon (BST) 8th June to get your thoughts in on Burnout 3: Takedown and Burnout Revenge.
Feel free to also chip in with any Legends/Dominator impressions too.
which game was it in the series that brought in the traffic checking? turned me right off the franchise now that you didn't have to dodge around traffic any more. :(
Are you covering the XBLA burnout minigame jobber too? That game was good fun in short bursts.
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Re: Our next podcast recording: Burnout 3 and Burnout Reveng

Post by ratsoalbion »

RoboticMonk3y wrote:
ratsoalbion wrote:OK, folks - you have until next Sunday afternoon (BST) 8th June to get your thoughts in on Burnout 3: Takedown and Burnout Revenge.
Feel free to also chip in with any Legends/Dominator impressions too.
which game was it in the series that brought in the traffic checking? turned me right off the franchise now that you didn't have to dodge around traffic any more. :(
Are you covering the XBLA burnout minigame jobber too? That game was good fun in short bursts.
Totally agree about traffic checking, which turned up in Burnout 3 and totalled the series for me.
We'll talk about the Crash standalone game as part of the Paradise show as it came last, chronologically.
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Re: Our next podcast recording: Burnout 3 and Burnout Reveng

Post by RoboticMonk3y »

oh, I'll hush my gums then ;)
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Re: Our next podcast recording: Burnout 3 and Burnout Reveng

Post by Scrustle »

My experience with Burnout 3 and Revenge are rather backwards, because I never owned a copy of Burnout 3 myself when it was first released, for a reason that's actually related to something that was mentioned on the last Burnout podcast. It was mentioned that the first two games were thought of as Gamecube games, despite no one on the show ever owning the games on that platform. I've always thought of those games as Gamecube games too, but because I actually always did own them on the platform. When Burnout 3 was released, I didn't own a PS2 or Xbox, and decided to wait for a GC version, which I had read in magazines at the time was coming.

Although I've always been familiar with the game, since a friend of mine had a PS2 copy back around release, it wasn't until very recently that I got my own copy of it, through the Xbox Live Marketplace in fact. The game hasn't aged a day. It's still utterly fantastic. It still feels great to drive, it looks vibrant and sharp, and the new additions it made to the series all stand up well. The Road Rage events, which have always been one of my favourite aspects of these games since I first tried it, are brilliant. They nailed it the first time they tried. Driving aggressively and taking down your opponents adds a whole different layer of intensity to the races, and it's so satisfying to execute. The game definitely deserves its reputation as an all time classic.

Although Crash Mode has never really been a significant draw to these games for me, I think they did it best in this game too. On the last Burnout episode it was discussed how the Crash Mode in the second game was the better because it didn't have the pick-ups and modifiers that 3 does, but I think it makes the mode far more interesting. In other incarnations of the mode, I always felt like too much of it was down to randomness, and once I hit the first car, there was nothing to do but just sit and wait until the somewhat arbitrary score came up. But with things like the multipliers and cash pick-ups, it adds much more interactivity and strategy in how you approach an intersection. I found it much more involving, and it seemed fairer too.

If there's one thing I would criticise the game for though, it's the soundtrack. It's hard to talk in depth about though, because I don't exactly hate it. It's mostly enjoyable, but not enough that I'd say I actually like it either. I think the best way to describe it is that it feels very much like it was aimed at the 14 year old of 2004.

I have a longer history with Burnout Revenge though. When I finally did get a PS2 I had already given up waiting for 3, and by then Revenge was the hot new thing, so I focused on that game instead. At the time I loved it. This was my first introduction to the new aggressive mechanics that 3 brought in, so I think much of the love people had for that game when it first came out was transferred over to Revenge for me. I've always felt like it was unfair the way people were disappointed with it, because as far as I was concerned, it did a very similar thing to 3, so if people liked that game then they should have appreciated this one too. I certainly liked it for a lot of the reasons people liked 3.

But I've been playing the game again recently on 360, and now I think I can see why people don't look on this one so kindly. There's still a lot to like here though. It's still a very good game. It's got the great driving feel of the series, and a very addictive unlock path like the others too. Doing takedowns and the like are also still very fun, especially when you manage to perform a rare vertical takedown. They also stepped up the kinaesthetics of the game too. They made the sound and visual effects of smashing and grinding your car in to others better than even before, which adds a lot to the experience. I also really liked the addition of the Crashbreaker mechanic in races. For some reason they decided to make Aftertouch useless in this entry, but being able to explode your opponents as they raced past more than made up for it.

But there are several changes they made to the formula which spoil it a bit. One of the biggest problems is that although they improved the effects surrounding the takedown mechanics, the way they actually award them seems to be a lot more unfair and arbitrary than in 3. You can hit an opponent really hard yet not take them down, or sometimes just gently tap them from behind and send them in to a wall. Sometimes when they hit in to you it won't seem to do a thing, and other times you'll be sent veering off uncontrollably from hardly anything. And it seems grinding alongside other racers does nothing, except when the game's physics gets confused and it decides to completely spin your car around. It also doesn't help that in Road Rage events, you can be driving for very long times without any opponents around to battle with at all, which is especially annoying considering how you are given extra time to continue the event by taking down opponents, instead of a fixed limit for the whole thing. It leaves you being unable to avoid failing because the game didn't give you an opportunity to do anything about it.

Another big problem is the track design. Unlike other games in the series, the sides of tracks are often littered with outcrops of walls in very inconvenient places. It feels unfair and even malicious in how they are placed. It leads to a lot of annoying crashes that can ruin entire races, especially when the game sometimes decides to respawn you after a crash right in front of one of these walls immediately. It's made worse by the aesthetic of the game too. For some reason Criterion decided it wanted to do the muddy grey/brown thing before even Gears of War, which is a disaster for an extremely fast paced racing game. Too often you're driving down a road where you can't pick out irritatingly placed obstacles, or even when a turning is coming up on some tracks.

And then there's the new mechanic of Traffic Checking. Perhaps the most common complaint about this game. But personally, I don't have that much of a problem with it. I do agree with what some people say; that it takes away too much focus from precise driving and tips the balance too much towards chaos, but that didn't ruin the experience for me. It felt like a logical extension of the other mechanics in the game, albeit one extension too far. It also added more options for battling opponents. It allowed you to take them down while they were out of reach, or even behind you, giving it a certain defensive quality. That said, I think I would have preferred it if they designed the game not to have this mechanic as part of it. It does turn the races a little too much in to a 200mph mobile demolition derby for my liking.

The soundtrack of the game is a similar story to that of 3. Except this time it feels like it was for the 15 year old of 2005. I guess they wanted to go after a very specific audience. Yet I think overall it is a slightly better selection, and one that's a little more suited to the game.
Roy42

Re: Our next podcast recording: Burnout 3 and Burnout Reveng

Post by Roy42 »

ratsoalbion wrote:Totally agree about traffic checking, which turned up in Burnout 3 and totalled the series for me.
Traffic checking turned up in Revenge, along with HIGH DEFINITION GRAPHICS that didn't have quite the same impact when I was still playing it on an standard definition TV.

I like traffic checking; maybe that's because I didn't learn about the Burnout series until I was shown 3 by my friend at his birthday and didn't experience the series when it was "pure", maybe it's because I always figured the games were supposed to be power fantasies, and causing as much consequence-free destruction while driving fast was kind of the point. Besides which, anyone who would want to be driving fast would be driving on the opposite side of the road anyway; traffic going your way runs out very quickly, and it barely gives you any boost like the oncoming lane bonus does.

I think the Burnout games are great fun for parties, yet at the same time, there's basically nothing to really ever say about them, and yes: the irony of saying this on the second podcast lasting over one hour about the Burnout games isn't lost on me. There are plenty of tracks, they look nice and control well, but once you see everything once you've basically seen everything that's not Crash Mode. It's a problem I have with most racing games, and it's maybe indicative of how they're best enjoyed with other people, and probably some liquor flowing through you.
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Re: Our next podcast recording: Burnout 3 and Burnout Reveng

Post by Flabyo »

The Burnout games before 3 are a completely different play style to those that came after. I don't know many people that like every game in the series, those who loved the first two tend to dislike the rest and vice versa.

I never really got on with the precision required to be any good at the first two, but loved the more forgiving physicality of the later games.

I guess you could say the early ones are driving simulation games and the later ones are arcade racing games. Kind of like comparing Gran Turismo to Outrun 2 really. (Interestingly I think Forza Horizon finds a good middle ground between the two play styles and is a game a lot of people will have passed over expecting a sim heavy game like the normal Forza games).
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Re: Our next podcast recording: Burnout Paradise

Post by ratsoalbion »

We're recording the final Burnout show a week on Monday 7th July so you've all got plenty of time to share your thoughts, experiences and opinions of Burnout Paradise. Thanks folks! :)
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Re: Our next podcast recording: Burnout Paradise

Post by Flabyo »

...I'm from a land called secret Estonia...

Paradise marks the beginning of the 'open world racer'. I can't remember if Test Drive Unlimited came out before it, but that game was so buggy that Paradise remains the best example of it until Forza Horizon.

The handling and mechanics here is even simpler and more friendly than that of Takedown. Your car is basically indestructible unless you drive face first into something at speed.

But having done that they were able to make a far more interesting and varied world. Glancing off fences, smashing through traffic lights, finding the many shortcuts. This isn't a game for racing purists, it's a game for people who want to go fast and have fun.

...cinnamon houses and liquorice skies...

Having a fixed world which you are eventually able to learn over time really helps. As the game goes on the racing stages get longer, but they end up stringing together sections of the world that you've learned. Hey, it's that bit round the canyons that I've learned to do really well, but in this race it's only part of the route...

And the game isn't only about racing. It caters for those who loved the takedown mechanics of the previous game with a specific mode that's all about that. Then it has a stunt chain mode which rewards those who learn how to 720 their car off a ramp. Then they throw in a time trial for every road in Paradise City (which range from the 6 second of Watt Street to some that are over 3 minutes long where only a perfect run will do). The crash junctions mode here is probably the weakest part of the game, it fails to capture what worked with that in the previous games.

...welcome to the creep show

On top of that they throw in the party mode online multiplayer. Get together with some friends and then fire off some challenges. 'Everyone must do a 720 off the highest hill'... 'everyone must perform a jump over all the other players on the beach ramps', 'first player to overtake the train wins' and so on...

It's not a perfect game, but it introduced a lot of things that went on to influence later games, and you could argue that with games like Drive Club and The Crew it has more influence on current game design than any of the previous Burnout games ever have.
Nekemancer

Re: Our next podcast recording: Burnout Paradise

Post by Nekemancer »

A while ago I had an itch to get a racer. That itch grew and grew until I finally gave in and bought my first racing game in years, Need for Speed Hot Pursuit (2010).

After spending more time in menus and loading than racing in that game, I set that game aside and let the itch go unscratched for another half a year.

Eventually I got over my disappointment in Hot Pursuit and gave Burnout Paradise a shot. Within five minutes I was racing down the streets with a huge grin on my face. People talk about how playing a great game will bring a smile to their face, but it has been a long time since a game came along that was just exactly what I was looking for.

On the fly challenges, stunt points, an incredible feeling of speed, great graphics, fun cars. This is a game where the developers went into it with the goal of making it FEEL good to do everything in it. It's easy to feel awesome when you fly off a huge ramp at high speed. It's much more difficult to feel great when you're getting wrecked every thirty seconds because you stumbled into a challenge that has other cars hunting you down and you only started the game a few minutes before that. Minor penalties and quick recoveries from wrecks make it more fun to just watch how great of a crash you just caused, rather than getting frustrated.

Paradise reminds me a lot of when I rented San Francisco Rush with my brother. Instead of racing, we just did a versus mode on a single level and spent most of the rental period launching cars off ramps, trying to wreck each other and trying to outdo each other with bigger and flasher wrecks. It's not a perfect game. But Burnout Paradise is my perfect arcade-y racing game. And I don't use the word perfect lightly.
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Re: Our next podcast recording: Burnout Paradise

Post by AndyKurosaki »

Had a lot of fun online with Burnout Paradise online. It was satisfying to fire it up, get the Live crew together and piss about. Then send out stupid pictures on every Takedown with the Live Vision camera. From thumbs up, to middle fingers up, from pulling faces to Lucy Pinders' bangers. Fun for all the family.
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Re: Our next podcast recording: Burnout Paradise

Post by Flabyo »

Oh, I forgot about it using the Live Vision Camera on the 360. I had one of those from work, and I think this was the only game I ever used it on. (It's now plugging into my Mac Mini as a Skype camera)
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