Need for Burnout: Paradise Lost
Anyone else horribly disappointed at how focus-group led this piece of shit would appear to be, from the demo at least? It distinctly reminds me of playing Need for Speed: Most Wanted, but with utterly predictable “multiplayer” thrown in for the hell of it.
Call me a bitter, jaded cynic, but I don’t give a shit who’s just pulled the longest handbrake turn in whatever random part of the available play area someone happens to be bumming around in at the time. What’s the point? For a (principally) point-to-point racing game, Burnout: Paradise seems to be more about cock-waving than actually seeing who’s the fastest from A to B. It also seems to be about griefing and generally being a complete dick.
I really can’t see how the full game can be any better than this, except you get more pretty scenery to whiz past / fly over, along with more flash motors to do such in. The crash physics? Great and spectacular as always. But where’s the soul, man?
Burnout seemed to be about smashing as much of the bubbly black crap out of your opponent’s vehicle as possible before you hit the finish line. Paradise’s modus operandi would appear to be focussed on simulating late Wednesday night at the local McDonald’s car park in Weston-super-Mare.
