Three words for this game: LAM3 A5 H3LL. Mediocrity at its best.
First off the gameplay is way too stupid. Its too much of an arcade racer for its own good. Youd expect a street racing game to at least have a little bit of realistic physics. Not here. The handling is too wild. Powersliding is there, but it goes too far out. If youre not carfeul you'll run into something and upset one of the 500,000 cops that are on one single freakin street in LA. And the storyline, dont get me started. Too late. This is a review after all. The storyline is just another piece of steaming hiphop trash. Youd think there would be no storyline needed due to the last games in the Rush series. Lets see; Your name's "T," you have it all. Then some rich a-hole takes it from you. So now you have to start all over. And suddenly everyone hates you. And why is it people hate you? If they liked you when you had money... oh thats right. In the hiphop world, money means fame. Riiight....
The graphics are ok. At first I was surprised at the size of the roaming area. Then I discovered theres not much to the roaming. The cars are unnoticeable. With all the other street racing games out there, its easy not to care what youre driving in this game. After all, you upgrade your "go-cart" to level 1 with only $1000 from West Coast Customs (tm). West Coast Customs (tm) is the best. West Coast Customs (tm) is the place to turn to for all your automotive CRAP! The entire game is just a launching pad for their company. They even include a useless segment in the video gallery for the West Coast Customs (tm) DVD.
The sound is ridiculous. Its endorsed by iRiver so whenever the music player starts up, you see iRiver. Whenever the music plays in the game, its instruments only. Never the vocals unless you use youre own soundtrack. I havent even bothered to listen to the sound effects of the game. The announcer is... lame. "This is the final lap! Youd better hurry for the win!" No 5hit Sherlock. I was just gonna put my car in cruise control, maybe stop for a donut, fill up my tank, then cross the finish line. Its okay, the AI doesnt even know where its going thanks to the innacurate gps system. When you listen to the voiceacting, you have lower your IQ about 150 points, and take 2500 out of 3000 words of the English language in order to understand it. I think Gorillas grunting would be the best way to describe it.
I rented this game last Tuesday. I played it for about an hour that night and I havent played it since. Its like my Xbox is tainted now.
This game is pure crap. I wouldnt pi55 on it to put out a fire. I wouldnt wish this game on my worst enemy, because he might give it to someone else, spreading the terror even more. The developers need to take a hint: stick to the original Rush. Imitating Need For Speed Underground is not going to win any new fans. It certainly didnt with me.