Flatout U.C. is not for those who bought FO2. It's for all of us who did not buy Flatout2, but we SHOULD buy this one!
Flatout is a brand of top notch arcade racing, concentrating on wrecking the cars, and unlike other games in the series, wrecking also the track. While the Burnout series concentrate on a max top speed, and does a great job doing that, demolition and thereby race dynamics is the focus of Flatout. The physics model is not that realistic, it is rather tuned for just fun game play. But it is a genuinely functional physics model, unlike the Burnout series, where the race cars feel like moving on a train track and in race collisions or 'take outs' feel like scripted in advance. In Flatout UC all car damage, track damage and pretty neat AI sum up to an infinite amount of outcomes of the same race, just as it should be. And again, it's not always realistic, but still in a way credible, and above all tuned to offer the max amount of fun.
So how does the wrecking work? It works great, both for cars and tracks. Cars have so many breaking parts, both for the pleasure of your eye and also for affecting the actual driving model. But that is pretty much standard for arcade racers. The Flatout value has always been in wrecking the tracks. There are hundreds, thousands if not tens of thousands of dynamic objects on the tracks, all waiting to be smashed into and spread out across the track for the other driver's misery. Many times you suffer from it yourself too, when you pass the spot on your next lap. But this you seldom think about, as there is so much of that stuff - everywhere. Then again, you want to smash into that stuff, because it so cool and you get some more nitro for every yet untouched object (or tens of them) you run into.
The cars are as they should, good physics, from light and fast to heavy and durable. Maybe the basic available cars could be varied more, and the car dynamics really get interesting only online, when you enable all bonus cars too. I'll tell you more about online later in this text. The driving model is simply rewarding, not too hard or realistic, but still a genuine driving model. After spending so much time with the Burnout series, the driving model really stands out in Flatout UC, and makes the Burnout driving model feel like old Lemans for C64.
While the single player career is inspiring, suitably hard and quite rewarding, it would still be only half a game without the online part - which is fantastic! I don't recall a single Xbox Live game that could give you a brilliant online gaming experience even with just 10 minutes spent from turning on the console to shut down. I personally prefer the race modes, but as some gamers find those challenging, there is so much more to choose from. Many times online, there are more demolition derbys ongoing than races. The derby's are a true cherry on top of the Flatout UC cake, just race around headless and run into the other players until you are the only one left with a car that moves. There are also refined gaming modes, like death match style derbies, where you collect frags and are resurrected when once killed. And last but not least, you can also play online the party games.
Party games is another characteristic for the Flatout series, what makes it stand out from all other arcade racers out there. Choose a car, select a stunt, race down the acceleration strip, and launch your driver through the windshield for: high jump, ski jump, bowling, curling and many many more different hilarious minigames. These party games are genuinely of Super Monkey Ball caliber.
Sum all this up, and a true classic is born. But please remember, don't do like most reviewers and compare this to Flatout2, as it brings little over that almost a year earlier launched Xbox1 version. Rate it as is, as a fresh new experience for Xbox360 owners, which it is to most consumers buying it. My bet is that you will then rate it higher than my 9.0