IGN - Very impressed with Motorstorm (Japanese version)

[Loke]

Link

Wow. We've just played through the final Japanese version of MotorStorm and we're still shaking from the experience. It's not hangover jitters either, rather the effect of adrenaline coursing through our veins after playing PS3's off-road epic on an eight-foot screen via a high-def projector. To say it looks awesome is an understatement: the earlier builds we've played looked impressive but now it's faster, more detailed and closer to the original E3 tech demo than we ever expected. In short it's the most impressive racing game we've seen in a long time and is a definite must-have come the launch of PlayStation 3.

[...]

Races are split into vehicle types rather than individual tracks so the same circuit can frequently appear in a single group of events. For example, there are three tracks in the In At The Deep End event - one set on the Raingod Mesa circuit, one on the Rock Hopper track and two on Coyote Rage - even though there are four races. However, only certain vehicles are eligible to compete in each race, with bikes, buggies, racing trucks and rally cars all grouped together rather than a free-for-all involving MotorStorm's entire garage of cars in one go.

That's not to say players are limited to a single vehicle. There are at least two to choose from for every race, albeit of the same type, and each available in multiple colours and designs. Although car-hungry gamers may feel cheated because they can't access every car right from the start, we like the way the cars are introduced gradually, given as a reward for winning races and earning points. What's more, each vehicle type handles very differently from the next, with heavy rigs gripping the track, ATVs bouncing around uncontrollably and rally cars sitting somewhere in the middle, so the staggered car roster helps players to gradually familiarise themselves subtle differences in handling.

The half-dozen tracks we played on are just as diverse as the vehicles too, not just in their design but also the different types of surfaces you race on. The Raingod Mesa track, which we covered in the last MotorStorm hands-on a couple of weeks ago, is located on top of a mountain and the hard stone surface provides fantastic grip, although boulders and sheer drops are lethally treacherous if you miss-time a jump or overdo it on the turbo.

[...]

Having spent a few hours caning cars, battering bikes and totalling trucks around some of most extreme courses we've seen in a racing game, we can happily report that MotorStorm really is shaping up to be the eye-meltingly fast racing epic it promised to be when it first debuted. It's fast, it looks incredible and, with almost a hundred race events to get stuck into, there's more than enough to keep speed freaks coming back for more. In fact the only feature missing was an online multiplayer mode, which apparently won't make it into the final Japanese game. However, it will make it into the US and European versions, along with downloadable content, so some things really are worth waiting for.

Also one guy from IGN, jkeeling, posts his impressions here.

A few snippets.

OK, so I probably played through 30 more events (10+ hours) of this over the weekend and the game is freaking awesome. I'm probably a third of the way through the Festival tour and the more advanced AI is starting to kick in making racing truly BRUTAL.

One I just played was 14 motorbikes and one massive armoured truck who's just smashing through the bikes left right and centre. It's pretty terrifying being in 1st place and seeing this huge thing coming at you from behind - imagine Spielberg's Duel but as a race. Brilliant.

Oh and props to Evo for naming two of their events 'Massive Damage' and 'Giant Enemy Crab' respectively. Good that SCEE has its sense of humour.

I think we need to do updated impressions on this as there's way more to the game. The night courses under crazy HD starlit skies are beautiful too.

Lol.

Nice to see Motorstorm shaping up this good, easily my most anticipated game on the PS3.

 

[Gargantou]

Seems quite fun, I might try it if my bro gets it with his PS3, if he'll even get his hands on one, I ain't buying a PS3 on launch though, too pricey and not enough games out to justify the price imo.

 

[guchi]

hypeometer just went up for this game, although I doubt I will ever get a PS3

Oh and props to Evo for naming two of their events 'Massive Damage' and 'Giant Enemy Crab' respectively.

 

[Warbie]

Motorstorm looks excellent

 

[Cerpin]

It looks pretty good, but unless they fix the non-existent sense of speed issue, I'm not getting it. (Bare in mind I have only seen videos, so I might be wrong here)

 

[Asknoone]

Never actually heard of Motorstorm, but it doesn't take much to impress IGN.

 

[DarkStar]

Never actually heard of Motorstorm, but it doesn't take much to impress IGN.

You should check it out. It might be the singularly most graphically impressive game I've ever seen. It may even have an edge on Crysis.

 

[dream431ca]

It looks pretty good, but unless they fix the non-existent sense of speed issue, I'm not getting it. (Bare in mind I have only seen videos, so I might be wrong here)

If you read the IGN article on the game, they state that the game is faster than it was before on the demo.

 

[Asknoone]

You should check it out. It might be the singularly most graphically impressive game I've ever seen. It may even have an edge on Crysis.

Yeah, looks kinda fun.

 

[smwScott]

The game does look awesome. Although I've never been a big fan of racing games, this one may be different. I probably won't buy it outright despite how impressive it is, but I will give it a rent.

And yeah, it's amazing they got so close to that E3 demo. They were constantly improving the game up until release. Each version of the game they showed looked significantly better than the one before it ... considering they probably didn't even get close to their potential the next game should look unbelievable.

So far the PS3 has a pretty good launch lineup. There's this and Resistance, both are games which I would consider "buy worthy." That's more than I can remember seeing for a system launch since N64 (Mario64 and Pilotwings). There's also some decent third party games coming out too, but apart from Rainbow Six and CoD3 I don't know about them.

Anyway, launches are almost always filled up with mediocre games that only sell because they have no competition, but it actually looks like theres some decent options for the PS3 launch.

 

[VictimOfScience]

This has been one of my top-most-wanted games since the first target footage was released and its awesome to see it meet that goal and perhaps surpass it? Time will tell, but it certainly seems terrific.

Too bad I will not have a PS3 til next Fall probably. And there had better be a 360 price drop in the Spring!!!