Hands-onMotoGP3

We recently received the final build of MotoGP3 from Namco and gave the game a preliminary spin today. For those not in the know, MotoGP3 is the latest in Namco's well-crafted motorcycle racing series. The new game maintains the positive qualities that made its two predecessors great while adding more content that should keep GP racing fans happy for some time to come.

MotoGP3's gameplay is quite similar to that of its forebears in that it can basically be tailored to suit players of all skill levels. Inexperienced racers can dumb the game down enough that they can run through a race without worrying about hassles like falling off their bike (for the most part). Hard-core motorcycle racing players can set their physics and control options high, on the other hand, making the game much more realistic, and in turn much harder. The game has standard difficulty levels, presumably to control the skill of the AI racers, but the most important variable that determines ease of play is a setting called simulation. If you set this switch to off, the bike physics become decidedly unrealistic, and you can fly around turns, smack into walls, and bump other riders without fear of falling off or wiping out. When simulation is set to on, however, the riding physics are more aligned with reality, and so just trying to take a turn at full speed will send your bike flying out from under you. MotoGP3 is really pretty hard in simulation mode, but it's also more rewarding than the easier mode after you've run through a track a few times and gotten your timing down properly.

You also get the standard array of control setup options in MotoGP3--acceleration and braking can be set to the DualShock's face buttons, shoulder buttons, or right analog stick. The latter of the three seems to provide the most precision when going around turns, but of course you can change the settings to your taste. You can set up your brakes so that you only have one brake control or, more closely resembling real racing, you can set separate controls for front and rear brakes. Of course, one brake is easier starting out, but two brakes give you better overall control as you corner.

MotoGP3 seems to have a lot more of, well, everything than its prequels did. The game has 15 tracks available at the outset, compared to the second game's 10, and 12 bikes are initially selectable, with blank slots for several times more than that. The challenge mode has a whopping 100 challenges, ranging from beating a racing legend in a one-on-one race to finishing a certain track in a certain time to reliving dramatic racing moments. Presumably, finishing these challenges will unlock extra bikes, drivers, and the like. The game has a solid look, with highly detailed bikes and riders and cleanly rendered tracks. Though the frame rate is perfectly smooth in the single-player mode and in one-on-one two-player, once you're racing in the split-screen mode with another player and a full track of AI opponents, the game tends to really bog down. The frame rate drop definitely isn't enough to seriously impact the playability of the game, but it's pretty striking all the same.

All in all, MotoGP3 seems to be a totally worthy successor to the previous two games in the series. Namco seems to be improving substantially on each game, which is refreshing at a time when many sports updates don't seem to add much at all to the previous installment. Look for MotoGP3 to show up in stores around the third week of March.