It’s not easy though, and each new set of cars bring its own specific timing and exaggerated handling characteristics to complicate matters. ![]() You’re now able to fill your boost meter and maintain a decent speed, and those environmental destruction triggers are within reach. Turn into the corner, hold the button and control your acceleration before releasing the drift after the apex, and suddenly the game transforms. Whereas if you hold the button through the whole corner (like a traditional Ridge Racer game, after all), you’ll inevitably oversteer and perform a 180. If you tap it to enter a drift as if you were using a handbrake, you’ll end up sliding into the nearest wall at 100mph before you know it (at lower performance tiers anyway). It is, in short, the key to success at every tier, and it works in a manner that’s totally counter-intuitive to almost every other racer out there. The first concerns the ubiquitous ‘drift’ button, which is never explained aside from a couple of tooltips on loading screens. The problems stem from two areas, both of which can hopefully be patched in the coming weeks. When it all comes together at the mid-level performance tiers and above, Unbounded is an absolute adrenalin-soaked joy to play, so it’s even more of a shame that a lot of players will give up long before they even break out of that first zone. Races become trails of high-speed drifting and destruction, with one set piece and smoothly navigated corner leading directly into the next wave of explosions and takedowns as you fight your way (literally) to the front of the pack. Once you’ve figured out the power meter it becomes key to success, and knowing when to conserve or unleash becomes second nature. On top of that, performing drifts, catching air or tailgating the opposition gradually fills a power meter, allowing you to activate a quick boost that can be used to trigger environmental set pieces or simply smash (“frag”, in Unbounded terms) your enemies into next week. A large portion of the scenery in Unbounded can simply be driven through, from stone walls to metal pylons and fences - which creates visual chaos on practically every straight and turn. The reason for their scarcity is probably down to the level of destruction offered up in Unbounded’s core racing modes, which do a good job of blowing things up during regular play. Frag Attacks offer a bit of variety and the chance to smash your way through enemy cars to score a victory, but they tend to act as pallet cleansers, and are few and far between. Domination races are the most prevalent (straight-up races against up to 11 other CPU drivers), whilst drift events and time attacks round out the traditional pedal-to-the metal modes. The events themselves are mostly broken up into four categories. Dominating races (which involves placing in the top three) unlocks new tiers and new locations, and the unrelenting difficulty means there’s plenty of longevity to be found in Shatter Bay. As you accrue those scores your overall racer level increases, unlocking tile sets, vehicles and various other trinkets to play with in the track editor (more on that later). Each of the themed zones is broken up into individual races, with high scores the primary focus for progression. The traditional singleplayer career mode is set in ‘Shatter Bay’, which is an amalgamation of locations that represent the industrial and commercial side of various US cities. ![]() It’s a little bit Burnout, it’s a little bit Split/Second, and it’s quite the refresh for a series that had developed its own seemingly insurmountable stylistic trench. It’s far more concerned with grime and ‘underground’ racing this time around, with the traditional rail-drifts and all-out acceleration ditched in favour of a more weighty, damage-laden physics model that crunches and grinds where the series used to gracefully slide. It’s a game of incredibly contrasting experiences as a result, with enjoyment levels mapping almost directly to whether or not the controversial drift mechanic manages to ‘click’.īacking it up a little, Unbounded is a departure for the Ridge Racer series as a whole, with development duties transferred to Flatout creators Bugbear. As much as we bemoan too much hand-holding in modern gaming, Unbounded takes the opposite route, leaving you to figure out its arcade racing mechanics entirely for yourself. ![]() If ever there was an an advocate for the inclusion of thorough tutorials in videogames, they’ll likely illustrate their point with Ridge Racer Unbounded for years to come.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |