Written by: Bodhruj Jaman;
Date: Thursday, March 20th, 2008;
Filed under: PS3, Reviews;
Tagged with: Burnout, Burnout Paradise, Need for Speed, NFS: Pro Street, Playstation 3, Pro Street, PS3, Reviews, video games.
Comments:

I’ve had Burnout Paradise on Sony PS3 since it came out, back in January, and I was meaning for this post to be my first, but obviously I had other things to write about regarding the Sony Playstation 3.

Paradise is a game that was originally released by Criterion to compete with NFS: Pro Street. We can all safely say it did that, can’t we? Criterion undoubtedly thrashed Need For Speed. The two games had a few things in common. HUGE maps, a lot of cars and umm - that’s about it really. Burnout Paradise reigned at No. 1 in all the game charts for PS3 for a good month, and that’s saying something!

Now. I willl admit that I haven’t actually played Pro Street for PlayStation 3, but I can say that Paradise is the best racing game on shelves at the moment (lets see how GT5 fares eh?). The graphics are pretty good GREAT, and the amount of events and cars to unlock are immense (75 cars and 120 events!).

Speaking of the events, there are also a great range of events to choose from. These include the classic races and road range events, but the game also hosts a load more, such as ‘Stunt Run’, ‘Marked Man’ and ‘Burning Routes’. The game also features one or two ‘Mano e Mano’ races, which are my personal favourites.

The cars are not only fantastically designed, they are also pretty customizable. You can change colours, paint types and finishes. And with 75 cars to collect overall, finishing the game including all the events won’t be easy (as I have said, I’ve been playing casually since January, and I have only collected 27 of the cars).

I’m just going to give you a taste of what the events are like:

Race: This is just a simple race, but there are no bronzes or silvershere - no, the only way to win is to come first - by ANY means necessary. There are a couple of Mano e Mano races around Paradise City, which are just one on one races.

Road Rage: The player has to get a number of Takedowns to win the game. The event ends when your car is ‘totalled’ or when your time runs out.

Marked Man: The player has to get to a checkpoint, which could be anywhere in Paradise City (which is HUGE). The catch is that there will be at least one opponent trying to KILL YOU!!! Its your job to get to the checkpoint in one piece.

Stunt Run: The player is given a target score to reach, and is left to find any kind of stunt possible in Paradise City.

Burning Routes: These are routes that come with every car you unlock. You have to complete the route within the time limit you are given and as a prize, you will get an upgrade of the car you were driving.

Now. No game is perfect, and I’ve only got one criticism for this game. The controls are a bit ‘wierd’. R2 to accelarate? Why not x?

So that’s all I have to say. I’ll try and get some of my own Burnout Paradise pics of PS3 gameplay soon.

Another (great?) review from PlayStation Heads.