Oh my, it’s been a while hasn’t it. Let’s put my unexplained absence down to, oh I dunno, scarlet fever or something. Or, let’s be more nerdy, let’s say I’ve been SO busy playing video games I didn’t have time to review or preview any of them. Yeah, that sounds good. Alright, start again. -ahem- Whoa! I’ve been so busy playing these video games I haven’t had time to talk about them on this website. Boy, that sure puts me in a bit of a pickle. How about I just pick one of said games at random and start writing about it? Hows about… Split/Second: Velocity?

Now before I took my accidental hiatus I intended on raving on about how amazing this game looked in a preview I had half-written. Truly, the demo was a masterpiece in selling this game to me. The premise of being a stunt racer on a TV show, where not only did you race hard and fast, you had to blow up everyone else on course, was one that I found most appealing, especially as I was going through one of those driving game phases I have every now and then. And who doesn’t like explosions? So finally I managed to get my hands on the retail game, and surprise surprise, it was an extremely enjoyable game. To begin with.

When you start off, you’re a plucky young stunt driver who has proven his mettle and is ready to enter the big leagues of televised violence. You get given a crappy car, and race against everyone else’s crappy cars, blowing them up in an extraordinary manner. To do so, you attain power in your power bar (handily placed on the rear of your car, making this a HUD-less game and all the better for it) by drifting, drafting and getting sweet air, although opportunities for sick jumps are few and far between. As you start winning races you earn points, and as you accrue more and more points you begin to unlock cars and the championship races that you are required to place 3rd or higher in to progress in the game. So far, so good.

The problems start when you begin to unlock better cars, because suddenly the game decides it’s had enough of going easy on you and starts throwing you into races against guys in much better cars than the ones you’re driving. It’s fine in the championship races (called Elite races in-game) because it makes sense; you’re being put against the best to prove you’re worthy of staying in the competition. But when every other average Joe starts blasting past you when you’re going full speed down a straight road and you never heard them approaching, things start to get a little silly. I don’t mind a bit of friendly competition, but when everyone in the game is much faster than you, it’s just borderline stupid.

Another oft-heard problem of the game is the longevity of the tracks. There are only five locations in game, and each has around 3 tracks to the location, so tracks start repeating early on while the game waits to show off the bigger and better locations. And that’s fine too, but that also means that you have to stick with the repetitive nature for a while before you start meeting some new challenges, by which time you’re already sick of the tracks. It helps in some ways; for example, you can start to work out how to avoid most of the explosions that your AI opponents will throw at you. But even then, there are just a few too many instant death traps that can’t be avoided in each course, the most annoying of which being situated in the power plant, where if you get caught in one of the trap filled hangars then you’re dead in the water and straight to the back of the pack. Yes, the game simply respawns you to an area just before where you died, and doesn’t even have the decency to give you a good rolling start. Crash in a race and most of the time you’ll have to restart and try again.
At least developers Black Rock (famous for the absolutely fantastic PURE, which I don’t have any negative words to say about) paid special attention to the graphics. Each location is stunning and very well lit, so you’re never unsure of where to go. Windows sparkle and glass shatters wonderfully. The explosions are all impressive, particularly the larger ones, which blast out across the whole track in one go. The sheer destruction within the game is breathtaking, although blemishes to the cars are non-existent; you’re either dead or alive. And even the explosions can get repetitive, after you’ve raced the same pieces of track a dozen times or more. The cars themselves all look pretty and shiny, but the customisation is disappointing. You unlock stickers for the car as you unlock achievements, but the game automatically puts them on for you, which can disappoint some people who loved the crazy amounts of fiddling around you could do on PURE. You can change the colour of the car at least, but it’s a minor thing that just brings to the foreground the lack of a good customisation system.

The music in the game is simple techno beats that play constantly throughout the races, although the soundtrack does manage to change up when you set off a particularly good explosion. Still, it’s the same four songs being played over and over, which can get pretty annoying after a while, so thank God that they’re pretty easy to ignore. Aside from the soundtrack all you’ve got is cars and explosions, both of which sound like, well, cars and explosions. What more can you really ask for from this game? Well, you could ask for the announcer to shut up between episodes, since he never adds much to proceedings except to annoy you with his stupidly stereotypical Hollywood voice-over man voice. Thankfully he’s only on for less than a minute at a time, but still, it would’ve been nice to not have to deal with him.

Wow, this is a longer review than normal. Might as well touch on the multiplayer a little. And I do mean a little. I played a grand total of two races, mainly because it was difficult to find a game in the first place, and then when I did, nearly every other racer had completed the game before coming on, and as such already had the best cars in the game, while I was about halfway to completion and stuck with my crappy little runners. Needless to say, going online is suicide unless you’re already geared up with the best cars. That said, if memory serves, there wasn’t a horrendous amount of lag in matches, so you should have a good time. Though it has been a while since I tried online, so don’t take my word for it. And other phrases a reviewer should never say.

Closing statements time I guess. Split/Second: Velocity has a stupid title (why did they add Velocity to it? WHY?!) but brilliant first impressions. But, like an attractive new girlfriend, once you spend some quality time with it and get to know it better, suddenly you discover layers of bitchiness and outright unfairness. It’s a shame really; this game could have been one of the best arcade racers of recent years, and is in fact a lot of fun. But due to repetitive tracks and explosions, AI drivers being stupidly good for no valid reason and the brutal punishment for crashing and burning, Split/Second falls just short. Hopefully Black Rock will go back and make something better out of it. Like PURE 2.

Score: 6/10

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