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Burnout Revenge Preview
Gamespot has a preview of the next title in the Burnout series, Burnout Revenge. From the article: "When we saw Burnout Revenge at E3, Criterion compared this year's crash mode courses to holes you might play during a game of golf, complete with a simplistic teeing-off mechanic that determines how fast you get off the line, fairways--aka freeways--full of hazards (like cars you don't want to crash into...yet), golf green-like areas (such as intersections that ooze carnage potential), and a hole that takes the form of a moving "target car" that's worth loads of points if you manage to wreck it. These comparisons still hold true, but Criterion has clearly been hard at work refining and improving upon the crash mode since it showed it off in Los Angeles." Given how good Burnout 3 was, I'm looking forward to this.
Or maybe you could just get over it and realize that they aren't the only game making company out there with questionable business ethic, just one of the biggest.
If you like Burnout or Oddworld, then play Burnout or Oddworld. If you feel so compelled to tell us about why you irrationally dislike EA, submit an article with an actual explanation instead of talking about how they're "evil."
Moving on the actual topic:
I'm already excited about the game just from the fact that you can become airborne in parts of the game besides Crash Mode (or whatever it will be called). My friends and I have played Burnout 3 to death and the new one is already sold to me just based on that.
For any 3d enthusiasts out there, Newtek interviewed Peter Lake, one of Criterion's head Art honchos a while back about the making of Burnout 3.
What they need to do is be smarter about all the damn loading screens. It really kills the energy of the game sitting through as many of them as you have to. Especially in crash mode. I did some of those crash levels a dozen times in a row trying to get gold. There's no reason I should've had to sit though a couple loading screens each time I reset the crash to try again. Everything should be there in memory, what are you loading for?
That was, by far, the most aggravating part of Burnout 3. All that being said, what an awesome game. Even my girlfriend loves it. She bought herself a smaller xbox controller for it. Games that I can get her to play with me are automatically winners in my book.
One time I threw a brick at a duck.
Most of the offenses of EA that we care about are to their employees.
And anyone who works in the industry will confirm that it's the exception to the rule to find a game development company that *doesn't* squeeze as many hours out of their employees as humanly possible at crunch time.
EA is certainly a great place to work. Their employee perks are the best in the industry. The ruckus of last year was confined mainly to *one* of EA's many studios.
Disclaimer: I work in the games industry and I have friends at various EA studios, and I'm reflecting their sentiments.
Today's weirdness is tomorrow's reason why. -- Hunter S. Thompson
They can start by removing the tracks with pillars that lanes actually dead-end into. Those go against the spirit of the game. It isn't a racing sim, where I have real control over the car. It's no fun to powerslide around a corner and crash by bad luck. Even worse is when a race on that track starts, like Kings of the Road, the AI bumps the player around and possibly into pillars. But restart the race and perhaps that time the bump will miss the pillar. If skill can't save the player, and it's just a matter of chance, that's stupid.
Also, they need more, if not all of the single-player tracks, available for multiplayer. My friend and I have played out all the multiplayer tracks, but half of the single-player tracks aren't available to us. How dumb is that?
They also need it to remember my audio settings. I don't like their 40 tracks that all sound like weak Alien Ant Farm and 311 alternative-light ripoffs. When I do single or multiplayer I want my five albums of Offspring, and I want Burnout to remember that.