Burnout: Legends

The Good
What I love to do best with this game is to play it in the car [while someone else is driving, that is...and hopefully fast and crazy...though usually it's my wife so I don't get that luxury].

Anyhow, back to the review. This is a fantastic little game.

Of course it's a racing game, but more importantly, many events are more about taking down as many other racers by forcing them to crash or just ramming them to death -- especially fun if you use the police cruiser. Even in a normal race you gain bonus points for causing your opponents to crash.

In fact, there's also a separate tour/campaign where all you do is produce spectacular pileups of passerby cars, buses, trucks, trains, and more.

The game is truly fast and furious, and you get a great sense of speed. The tracks are also quite varied and there a quite a lot of them, each with a number of different types of events you can play on them.

There also are quite a number of different car classes that are unlocked as you progress through the races (starting from compact to muscle cars to trucks and fast fast sports cars), and they exhibit their unique behaviour.

The Bad
Not very much negatives... it's a great game. That said, if I had to nitpick, these would be it:

• The tour (campaign) is very long and there are 175 races/events to compete in to unlock everything. It can be a little tedious, but it's a good problem to have!

• The cars within a class don't seem to behave that different. For example, you have 3 basic cars in each class that all seem to handle the same except the way they look. The other unlockable special cars in a class do seem better though.

• Some unlockables require multiplayer events to complete, which can be hard to find since it's an older game.

• I found the music a bit annoying -- maybe I'm too old now. It's mostly hard pop-rock, like alternative rock that sold out to the masses. Sorry I'm being an indie music snob here!

• Graphics are a little rough, so sometimes it's hard to see turns and traffic when you burn rubber extremely fast.
  
  The Bottom Line
  A wonderful little racer that's more than just racing. You have to understand this is not only a racing game, but that driving crazy, weaving, drifting, and crashing are all tools you need to be successful in here.