Crash 'N' Burn Hands-On

We recently had a chance to try out the PlayStation 2 version of Eidos' upcoming racer Crash 'N' Burn, which is currently in development at Climax. Described to us by one Eidos representative as a combination of Destruction Derby, Need for Speed Underground, and Burnout, the game certainly incorporates features from all of those games and adds a few of its own for good measure--including online support for up to 16 players.

We spent most of our time with the game racing a relatively short circuit set in San Francisco (other locales will include New York, Miami, and LA). Since it featured a crossover, spectacular crashes were a regular occurrence. None of the cars in Crash 'N' Burn are licensed, but all of them feature realistic damage models that respond not only to collisions, but also to scrapes along walls and driving through fires--which you can start yourself by using your nitro boost close to an oil puddle on the circuit. The damage was primarily cosmetic (our car's arcade-style handling wasn't noticeably affected by it), but once our car's health bar was depleted, we were left sitting in one of the many metallic carcasses that typified the latter stages of every race.

We noticed that only four or five of the 16 starters in a standard 10-lap race would make it to the finish in most rounds we played, and with every one that dropped out, it became harder for us to avoid the debris littering the track. Oil puddles also proved to be a big problem, particularly as some of them spanned the entire width of the circuit in places and, as such, were impossible to avoid completely. Other gameplay modes promise an even greater car mortality rate and have names like kamikaze, running man, last man standing, assassination, and bomb tag.

We look forward to bringing you more information on those gameplay modes, as well as Crash 'N' Burn's extensive vehicle customization options, as the game's November 15 release closes in.