As published on cgno.com...

When Burnout Revenge was released for the Xbox and PlayStation 2 it brought a facelift to the series that made it one of the best racers on both consoles. When the 360 version was announced I caught myself shuddering at the prospect of another Gun—a simple port with no additions that was slapped with an extra $10 to the price tag. Luckily, Criterion included enough to differentiate Revenge between the two generations of consoles. The result is a game that doesn’t change any of the core single-player experience but adds bells, whistles and an entirely new spin to its online racing format.

That new format takes the form of revenge stat tracking that lets you know who has been plastering the pavement with you and also who you’ve been schooling. Small, red targets and green exclamation points will hover around Live tags while browsing the game lobbies to give players an immediate indication of whether or not the racers in a game are people they’ve seen before. Of course any takedown score, no matter how big, can be eliminated by someone settling a score. That means if you have 2, 5 or even 10 takedowns in a row against a certain player the number will evaporate the moment he or she retaliates.

But don’t think of these numbers as your only motivation to go about slaying. Burnout Revenge makes sure that even if you don’t have a grudge, you’ll still want to slam other players into guardrails and highway dividers. The game calls out players for various reasons at the beginning of races. Accompanied by some of the game’s excellent sound effects, a close-up shot of the race’s rankings leader, series leader or any revenge rivals may pop up with messages that not-so-subtly imply their destruction. It’s not enough that you can bash people around the race tracks; the game makes a point in making sure who you need to take out to win and that’s what makes the online racing such a joy.

If there’s any problem with the online format it’s that Revenge still—at the time of this review 3 weeks—has post-launch connectivity issues. In dozens of matches conducted on two different 360 consoles, which used the connections of three major U.S. broadband providers this writer suffered a 30% lost connection rate. Any frustration you feel trying to find a good lobby with players that will stick around is magnified by the fact that at any moment, for no reason, you may be disconnected from EA’s servers. It’s not uncommon to lose two or three players from a full lobby by the end of one race. It wouldn’t be nearly as mentionable if you didn’t have something to lose from it. This writer’s “Rep” was brought from 100% positive to 70% negative from a myriad of reports that stated I quit early as a result of disconnections. For players concerned with their perception in the Xbox Live community they may want to steer clear.

But if your Rep includes a few faulty attributes that cast doubt on your abilities you can always correct them by showing off your insane driving skills. The 360 version includes a brand new feature—Burnout Clips. These clips can be recorded for up to 30 seconds at the end of every race. They can then be saved and uploaded to the Internet where you can recommend them to friends and recent players. It’s a great way to preserve the best moments of the game like getting successive takedowns, doing insane drifts or catching massive air.

You’ll also notice one important fact about the 360 version of Revenge—it looks fantastic. Criterion used the extra time efficiently to deliver a visual feast for its players. The cars do suffer a bit from the shininess effect that has plagued some of the 360’s games but Revenge’s vehicles fall neatly between the plastic-look of Full Auto and the crisp and refined polish of Need for Speed: Most Wanted. As far as the environments are concerned however, the game ranks up there with the best. Buildings, vehicles and objects whiz by and are proportioned enough to give a fantastic sense of speed as you zoom through the streets. Cars explode in fantastic detail with bits and pieces landing in just about every direction. Hoods, doors, tires, rims and every other part you can think of will fly off on impact and reduce what was once your tricked-out ride to nothing more than a crumpled heap of scrap metal. Vehicle damage is proportionate to the amount of paint lost and it’s not uncommon to have a dented heap covered in primer and only a few patches of actual paint left.

The last addition to the game that differentiates it from current-generation titles is the achievements system. Burnout Revenge is a departure from what we’ve seen thus far from EA-published games. Achievements consist of a few that are easy to obtain like playing a game online or taking someone down online, but those are the exception. The vast majority of the achievements are obtainable only after many hours of playing time both off and online. The type of free ride that came with Madden, it seems, is over.

But enough with the new. For anyone new to the Burnoutseries you may need a refresher. The game consists of two different areas—racing and crashing. Racing will take the form of standard matches like Race, Burning Lap, Grand Prix and not-so-standard like Road rage and Eliminator. Included in the latter part of that list is Traffic Attack, a new element to the Burnout series. Traffic in the game acts a lot like explosive ordinance—mostly dormant until activated. When you hit a car from behind it propels through the air and takes out anything nearby, which may include a few pesky rival racers. Note that you can only hit a small vehicle from behind. Semis, buses and any approaching traffic will reduce your racer to bits and pieces. The inclusion of traffic as a weapon changes the whole dynamic of the game in that you no longer need to scrape bumpers, or roofs, to score a takedown.

The other half of the Revenge equation is Crash. As evidenced by the name, the main objective is to crash into as many objects as possible and rack up a set amount of dollars in damage. Getting traffic to collide is the main way to up the cash amount but explosions also factor in. Some vehicles will explode on impact but others will need some persuasion. By persuasion, of course, we mean the Crashbreaker ability. If all vehicles had a remotely-detonated bomb in them they would have a Crashbreaker. When vehicles in Crash mode collide it fills some of a flaming bar. When that bar reaches 100% you get to use a Crashbreaker and detonate your car. The resulting explosion will blow up mostly everything in your vicinity and increase the dollar amount even more.

The final retention from the current-gen version is the awesome soundtrack. You may not want to utilize the custom soundtrack option since Burnout Revenge includes a bevy of punk and alternative rock selections that fit in nicely with the game’s explosive premise. A few techno songs seem out of place but can easily be turned off in the EA Trax menu. Background music will garner the least of your attention however as Revenge features incredible sound effects with each clank, scrape, explosion and shattering glass being distinct and loud. You owe it to yourself to use a surround system to appreciate the richness of the sounds which will come flying at you from every direction as cars explode all around.

When the dust settles, Burnout Revenge does a lot to stand out from its current-generation counterparts. The extra encouragement during online races, addition of editable clips and increased visual goodness may not justify an additional purchase for people who bought it for their Xbox or PS2 but for those who waited to see how the 360 version would turn out the choice is obvious. Burnout Revenge is an excellent game for anyone who loves racing, explosions, carnage or any combination thereof.