MotorStorm: Pacific Rift (PS3)

Spin your wheels again, but this time in a tropical paradise
10/30/2008 7:17 PM | 0 Comments | Page 1 of 3

Can someone send MotorStorm: Pacific Rift developer Evolution Studios the memo about games that don't move forward? The one that says you should always give the player some sort of reward, even (especially!) if he fails? The one that went to Codemasters when they made GRID, Rockstar when they made Midnight Club: Los Angeles, and Sony Liverpool when they made WipeOut HD? The one that explains the difference between challenge and frustration?

It's not that big a deal that Evolution missed the memo when they were making the first MotorStorm. It was probably a crazy time for them, what with making a launch game for the PlayStation 3 and all. I'm sure things were awfully hectic, so the memo got misplaced or thrown out. But it's been a year and a half, and the only reason I can imagine they made the same MotorStorm mistakes a second time is that they still haven't seen the memo.

Stuck in the (lovely) mud

I've been trying to get through a handful of races for a while now, and it seems entirely hit or miss whether I'm going to finish one, or whether I'll have simply wasted my four minutes for the umpteenth time. Does that make me a whiny baby? Maybe. But us whiny babies have plenty of other games to play besides MotorStorm: Pacific Rift.

To be fair, this isn't a bad racing game on most levels. It's got style in spades, sporting a combination of extreme racing and idyllic natural tracks, with a touch of "The Road Warrior." The new tracks look great and they manage to wring maximum variety from the tropical isle setting, with beaches, mountains, jungles and even that staple of videogaming, hot lava. While a lot of this is just eye candy, the game's boost mechanics play nicely with water and lava. Instead of grabbing power-ups for turbo-boosting, MotorStorm vehicles can boost freely -- but they build up heat when they boost. If they build up too much heat, they'll explode (unlike the real world, exploding is just a temporary setback). The twist is that water will cool down the turbo boost, and lava will heat it up faster. Some of the lava levels actually have periodic misters to put out lava fires. Cute. I've never been so happy for a mid-race car wash as when I'm on the rim of that volcano.

But the tropical setting is mostly an excuse for some really lush graphics. If there's a better looking racing game out there, particularly one so overgrown with nature, I haven't seen it. From the water effects to the volcano's steam, from the grand mountaintop vistas to the punishing close quarters of a run-down sugar plantation, from the rickety bridges to the dense fronds to the obligatory waterfalls, Pacific Rift is as visually inspired as the top-of-the-line shooters. The presentation is also excellent, with cool flyers and clever names for each track.

I'll get to Scotland before ye

There's a lot of great level design here, and not just visually. The tracks are wildly criss-crossing playgrounds of high roads, low roads, middle roads, shortcuts, ramps and tunnels. When you combine these with the types of vehicles, there's a nearly infinite combination of ways to drive (and mess up) each of the included 16 tracks. Each vehicle class has pros and cons when dealing with different routes. Motorcyles and ATVs, for instance, are ideal for ramps and narrow winding paths, whereas big rigs can plow through mud and water, and rally cars need long straightaways. The driving physics are top-notch. MotorStorm: Pacific Rift isn't afraid of traditionally frustrating mechanics like inertia and traction, and each vehicle type has a distinct feel. The new monster trucks are especially annoying in multiplayer, because they're big enough to run over small vehicles and fast enough to actually catch up with them.