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Ford Mustang
Having driven a Mustang quite some time ago whilst on vacation in Hawaii
(and yes that is another story), I totally fell in love with the car and
was keen to see what this game had to offer. Unfortunately not a hell of
a lot as I was to find out almost immediately.
I think that punters will
immediately try to draw comparisons to other racing titles on the market
and I’ll be the first to say, don’t. Quite simply put it doesn’t hold up
to them and you’ll feel rather miffed about it all if you do try to.
What this game does is show you Mustangs from the day dot and you get
the chance to take them on the track and see what they can do. Or not.
There are a few slight changes
from the PS2 version for Xbox however not enough to warrant much
attention. I felt that the controls were a bit better and there had been
some graphical improvements, but I am not convinced this is a deliberate
effort though and just more to the fact that the Microsoft has a bit
more under the hood.
Graphically the title looks like
a weak sister of Gran Turismo or Midnight Club and the handling of the
cars is not realistic with there being no full on feeling of the car
being driven by you but rather floating along at your command. Add to
that no damage models on any of the vehicles and you are guaranteed a
good looking ride every time, regardless of what happens on the road.
Loading times on the game are
not very fast and the title is not programmed to even keep the track
that you are on in memory so if you want to replay the title, you have
to wait for a time whilst it is loading again. A nice part of the game
is that you can push your opponents into oncoming traffic which will
allow you to skedaddle through nicely. Then its nervous time as your
opponents can return the favour, wrecking your chance of a win nicely.
They are never too far behind either which always makes for a fast
game.
There are 22 different courses
winding their way around a smaller number of areas so you are likely to
get very used to the game, which in and of itself isn’t a bad thing,
it’s just something to bear in mind before cursing at the screen that
everything looks the same.
You can earn points during the
race by performing good skids or other wacky turns and these will all
add up toward your score, allowing you to unlock more Mustangs that
those zany guys thought would be a good idea to squirrel away. There are
no upgrades to your cars; what you pick is what you get so make sure
that you are kick ass from the get go!
There is no Live Support for
this title which would have redeemed it a little with the chance to at
least drive badly with others around the world. I would have thought
with the SDK so readily available that net code would just be standard
in something like this.
All things said and done, this
game tanked a bit in my books and I’d only really think that those who
could not afford a better product or those who drool at Ford Mustangs
are really going to get anything out of it. I do believe the title meant
well but possibly was shoveled out too quickly to meet some sort of
deadline without a great deal of quality testing or feedback by gamers.
Give it a rent and see what you think.
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