"Red Asphalt" is a really fun racing/combat game! I was surprised since
people posted up info about how certain mags said it had bad control and
other issues, but I am pleasantly relieved that this isn't true. The
first thing that hits you is that this game is Dripping with ATMOSPHERE.
Name another racing/combat game that has an _actual story_ and
characters that have their own backgrounds and Cool CG Endings! The
intro for "Red Asphalt" is like, 2-3 _minutes_ long!! and it tells the
tale of Motormouth, the main dude in the game, and his battle against
the evil villain, Draenek and his evil Horde.
Then you get into the Interface screen with the menus and it Rocks! I'd
have to say that this is one of the most original menu interfaces I've
ever seen. Then, like Mega Race, except cooler, you can pick different
cars, and they all have cool Car Commercial movies that you can play! I
don't know who they hired for the voices, but they sound really
'familiar' - i.e., some of them sound like actual Car commercial
spokepeople! Really cool. You can pick different Characters to be as
well, and here it's also cool - They each have different attributes and
stuff, like "Driving" "Tactical" and "Aggression" abilities! You can
upgrade their stats, like an RPG! when you win races. Pretty crazy and
actually pretty cool because this gives the game a refreshing twist. I
don't know who the Artist is for the Character Art, but this painted
stuff looks Fraggin' Awesome!! You can also Upgrade Car Equipment, like
Tires, Offensive Weapons, and stuff.
Now the game itself: One thing that makes "Red Asphalt" stand out is, as
aforementioned, the MOOD of the game. When you start a race on a New
World, you're treated to a cool CG Movie about the upcoming races and
the Boss for that planet and it forwards the story a little more. Your
goal is to Race against Draenek's bosses and his drones, across various
planets in the galaxy and eventually meet up against Draenek himself!
The gameplay is solid. The first car I bought, Bombak? or something like
that, was kinda stiff and handled kinda bad, but then I messed around
with the Cash I won, and I bought new tires for the car and it makes a
BIG difference! It still was tough, but it's only the first car. The
control of the car is solid and good, and you have basically,
"Accelerate" button, "Brake," "Offensive Weapon" and "Defensive Weapon"
button, and "Nitro" button. The weapon effects are pretty sweet and the
explosions are killer!
I don't know what EGM was smoking, but the Control for this game is
Good! Sure the first car was kinda weak, but the 2 other cars I bought
later, Aztek and Hellfalcon (this baby Rules! BTW), were Sweet! They
could do Ridge Racer Powerslides with ease and I was having a blast
flying around a corner doing a Powerslide and locking onto an enemy
drone and firing off my missiles!!
Another cool thing is that there is TONS of Voice in this game! The
coolest thing is after looking in the End Credits, I noticed that they
hired Michael Haley (the awesome voice of The MAXX) to do Motormouth!!
Yeah! There are Taunts and win quotes and lose quotes and all sorts of
sayings, and they are all different for each character! (I only tried 3
different characters so far, but they all have different sayings and
stuff)! The voice and sound effects are pretty clear and come across
well.
And like I said, there are Endings in the game! After I beat the game I
was expecting just credits and maybe a picture of a car. But there are
different endings for each character! And lastly, there's a 2 Player
Link Up mode! Yeah! I played against a buddy of mine and there's no
better fun than blasting away your buddy in Deathmatch! Or what's cooler
is that they have 2 Player COOPERATIVE mode! You and your friend can
play together as a Team against the CPU and Draenek across all the
races! Too Cool!
Overall, I'd give it about an 8.0 out of 10. Pretty fun game!
Oh, if you want to reply to me, please Post directly to this board.
Earthlink is giving me problems with my mail account ;(.
Late,
k