Test Drive Unlimited review (PlayStation 2)

Quite a few people are getting reasonably excited about this Melbourne House port of the Eden racer and are amazed at how well the PS2 version holds up against the Xbox 360 version. But where the free-roaming island arrives relatively intact, there are many features that haven't made the cut.

At its core, TDU Xbox 360 game had an interesting concept of being able to drive around the 1000 miles or so of Oahu road. The majority of the fun came not from the plethora of races and challenges on offer but instead from the ability to drive around the Hawaiian island, taking in the sights, chilling out for a while and getting to check out the interiors of some of the cars you’ve always wanted to sit in but knew the car salesman would never let you anywhere near.

While it wouldn’t be fair to lament over the drop in visual quality, it has had an effect on the enjoyment you’ll get out of the game as taking time out to drive around Hawaii suddenly doesn’t become as enjoyable. The lush grass, the highly detailed towns, the rolling hills, the beachside roads, especially when viewed from the interior view, all looked amazing and really gave you the feeling that you were really there.

Watching copious amounts of bland fields, flat grass and repetitive looking towns, through a poorly detailed interior view really doesn’t have the same effect. Don’t get me wrong, visually it’s not bad at all for a PS2 game and in some places (the sky being a prime example) it can be absolutely gorgeous. It’s just that with the loss of the scenery TDU loses what made it stand out from the crowd in the first place.

Are we there yet?

There are a huge number of races on offer, scattered across the whole of the island, often requiring you to drive long distances to the next race. But while these races make you travel to every corner of the island, they’re all a little too similar. There are time-trials and speed challenges on offer as well, but again they all feel repetitive and often re-use the same sections of road that you’ve travelled over many times before. Without the 360’s missions to help keep things varied, the action does tend to get a little tiresome after only a few hours play. The races themselves are fun but they suffer from poor AI, with cars regularly barging you out of the way just so they can get back on the racing line. They only offer up a challenge if they’re in a higher performance car, but even then they never seem to use the full amount of horsepower that their car provides them with.

A master points system has been added to the PS2 version, which encourages you to drift round corners and slipstream other racers, similar to the system used in Project Gotham. These points unlock more challenging races so there is an incentive to rack them up as quickly as possible. Unfortunately there is no risk involved here, as crashing into barriers or into other cars just banks the points you’ve gained up until impact.

Crashing into objects produces some odd results. Hitting a barrier just means you can ride along it at near top speed whilst trying to take a shortcut over a flowerbed results in your car going from 150mph to zero in an instant. Amusingly whilst pansies stop you dead, hitting a speed sign results in just a little loss of speed as you carry on regardless, ripping it out of the ground in the process.

Automatic for the people?

67 cars from various manufacturers are available for purchase or hire, which is disappointing when compared to the 120 that the Xbox 360 version featured. No matter what cars you purchase, they all have handling that leans more towards arcade than realism.

That isn’t necessarily a bad thing depending on your preference, but I was expecting TDU to provide more realism and I felt a little let down with the arcade style of handling. Buying houses is almost as important as buying cars with each house providing you with a garage with which to store your cars in. They also act as great shortcuts to races as you can warp to each house without having to drive there.

Surprisingly TDU doesn’t allow you to opt for a manual gearbox. Whilst you can flash your lights, put your windows down and look to each side of you, you can’t manually change the gear of your car. This really is an amazing oversight and one I just can’t understand the reasoning of. Surely a game that is trying to appeal to the car enthusiast should have the option to manually change gears. It’s frustrating to be going up a hill labouring in fifth gear with the engine struggling and having all the other cars go flying past you, purely because you can’t change gear yourself.

Online’s where it’s at

Looking up, that’s a lot of negative points. In fact looking at the notes I made whilst playing the game the negative points outweigh the positives almost 5/1. But then why did I still play on even when I’d seen enough to write the review? I knew the races were going to be similar, I knew the scenery wasn’t going to change and I knew the AI would frustrate me race after race, but I carried on driving regardless.

I can’t quite put my finger on it, but TDU despite it’s many faults is still an enjoyable game. Perhaps the setting is responsible, refreshing change of not another racing game relying on night-time races with neon lights and pimping up your rides to excessive levels. Or that no matter where you drive on the island the roads are available to you without any load times.

Then again perhaps the online features of the game make it worthwhile. True these aren’t as fully evolved as the Xbox 360 version but considering the limitations of the PS2’s online play, they do a good enough job. Setting up races can be a pain as the map constantly repopulates itself, but the races are relatively lag free and offer a much more competitive experience, with up to eight players racing against each other at once. You can even carry on with the single player mode whilst you’re online, dipping into online races whenever you feel like it. Unfortunately there isn’t a split screen option though so online is the only multiplayer experience available.

TDU is still a game that I would recommend people to try despite the flaws. A fairly shallow as racing games go but provides upwards of 40 hours of single player action and a never ending supply of online entertainment. Whether the game is for everyone is debatable and it’s certainly not the best that the genre has to offer, but at the right price and if you take it online, Test Drive Unlimited still has plenty to offer.