Redefines what an arcade racer can be.
Open-ended world and gameplay; Amazing graphics; Races and crashes are better than ever; Seamless and fun online play; Excellent soundtrack.
The Bad:
Open world means that races are a little harder; DJ and pop-up tips are annoying; Huge world can be intimidating at first; No quick "retry race" or split-screen options.
Burnout is one of the best arcade style racers around. Now the newest addition to the series is here, and it is the best thus far. Burnout Paradise changes the formula of the series by giving the player an open world to explore. Right from the start, the entire city is open for you explore.
Although this can be intimidating at first, especially for new players, the end result is a truly unique gameplay experience. Once you played it for a few hours, you'll realize that it's the same old Burnout. Just that all the "tracks" are connected now.
GAMEPLAY – 9
Burnout Paradise controls nearly identical to past Burnout games, and that's a good thing. The controls are easy to pick up, but allow for a great deal of strategy in your driving style.
Since the entire city is open to you right from the start, you'll probably send the first hour or so exploring. Races are started at street intersections. Simply pull up to the intersection for the race to want to do, and smoke your tires (hold the brake and hit the gas) to start. Each race has it's own start and finish lines, but how you get to the finish is up to you.
The GUI shows the name of the street you're currently on, as well as cross streets as you approach them. During a race, the cross streets and your car's turn signal will blink to indicate which way towards the finish. This isn't always the fastest route, and you'll have to find shortcuts on your own. But this feature is dynamic, so if you get off course, it will point you back in the right direction.
Also new are the service stations. There are several different types that offer various benefits when you drive through them. You can do this at anytime, including during a race. Gas stations refill your boost meter while repair stations fix your car. Paint shops will change the color of your car to a random color, and don't provide any real benefit. Junkyards let you choose what car to use, but you can only use them outside of a race.
Speaking of cars, there are over 70 cars in the game. Each car fits into one of three classes: speed, aggression, and stunt. Speed cars are the fastest, but have a boost meter that can only be used when it's completely full. Aggression cars are larger, and can take more damage during a race or road rage events. Stunt cars are more balanced, and suited to doing stunts like crashes and flips. Doing stunts in these cars will fill your boost meter faster.
The way new cars are added to your junkyard is also great. When you complete certain events, a new car will start to appear at random in the city. When you see it, you must do a takedown on it to add it to your collection for use. It's almost like a boss battle for Burnout. This is a great way to make this process more interactive.
As far as race types go, all the usual suspects from past Burnout games are back, but with a few new additions. You have your normal race from point A to point B, and Road Rage where you're tasked with taking down a set number of cars. New is the Marked Man race. This race pits you as the target, and the other cars try to take you down. The crash mode is gone, but it's been replaced with Showtime. Instead of having pre-set intersection crashes, you can now do a Showtime anytime you crash by holding the shoulder buttons as you crash. This makes the crashes much more fun as you can do them anywhere at anytime. There's also a parallel parking event where you need to use the e-brake to spin and park your car at a high rate of speed.
The only downside to the gameplay is that there's no split-screen play. Although this wont matter for most people, it is annoying for those that loved to play Burnout with people in the same room. The open-ended gameplay also poses a new problem. Since you don't start or finish a race at the same location, this means having to drive all the way back to the start of the race to try again. If you're trying to win a specific race, this can get very annoying.
GRAPHICS – 10
Burnout Paradise is one of the best looking racers on the 360. It may not be as pretty as Forza 2 or PGR4, but where it really shines is in the physics. The crashes are very realistic. When you crash your car, the camera changes to a slow-motion view to really show how brutal the crash is. Cars crumple and deform in very realistic ways. Parts will fly off the car, but perhaps best of all is the way the glass shatters.
The cars have nice reflection and bloom touches. The smoke and spark effects also look very nice. The backgrounds are very detailed. Objects will blur as you race past, and there's a very good sense of speed in the game. Best of all, the graphics run at a constant 30fps with no dips in performance. The only gripe I could come up with is that there's no day/night transitions or bad weather effects. But those are very minor details.
SOUND – 9
The Burnout series is known for having awesome soundtracks, and Paradise doesn't disappoint. The main title screen tune is, of course, Guns 'N Roses' "Paradise City." Other artists include Alice In Chains, Killswitch Engage, and many others.
The sound effects are like-wise top notch stuff. Crashes sound brutal and dramatic. Each car also has a unique sound to the engine and nitro boost. The downside is the radio station DJ. Yes, CRASH FM is back, and just annoying as ever. The DJ serves as the in-game help and tutorial. He isn't voiced very well, and when he gives you tips, the whole screen pauses while he speaks and a subtitle scrolls at the bottom. This won't happen during a race, but it happens so often outside races early in the game that I just turned the tips feature off.
VALUE – 10
Like any modern game, the real lasting value is going to come in the form of online play. That isn't to say there isn't much single player content. In fact, quite the opposite is true. Burnout Paradise does an excellent job of stat tracking. The in-game map shows you all of the races and service stations you've found. It also shows you what time and crash records you've set on every street in the city. It's going to take you a while to find all the hidden super jumps, shortcuts, and billboards. That's also a good incentive to just explore the city on your own.
Once you're ready to play online, all you need to do is press the right d-pad. This easily lets you see who in your friend's list is online, and makes it real easy to start races. Not only can you do the usual competitive races from single-player, but also new co-op events. These events task players to perform stunts and jumps together as a team. The wide variety of events online means that this is going to be one game that's hard to put down for a few months.
The achievements are a little on the easy side, but are a good mix between online and offline. Some of the tougher ones will take you a while. Such as getting 100% in the game, or smashing all the billboards in the game.
Overall, Burnout Paradise is an outstanding racing game. The open world is a huge improvement to the series, and gives the genre a fresh take on arcade racing. The wide variety of event types and things to do mean that you'll keep coming back to this game for a long time. If you're a fan of racing games, this is a must buy. Even people that normally don't get into racing games should try it out. Burnout Paradise is the new bar which other arcade racers will be judged against.