Project Gotham Racing Review





Developer: Bizarre Creations Publisher: Microsoft
Release Date: November 9, 2001 Also On: None

At the launch of Xbox, Bizarre Creations and Microsoft Game Studio released a game by the name of Project Gotham Racing. People looked at this game and did not know what to expect. Would it compete with PS2’s Gran Turismo, read on and you will find out.

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PGR’s graphics are astonishing. The cars are beautiful and have every last detail down to the bone design of it. The cars even show damage depending on how you drive or if you hit a wall hard. The cities are kind of plain and don’t have the kind of detail you would expect from other racing titles. However, the rain effects are probably the best part about Project Gotham. The rain bounces off the asphalt and your windshield and even puddles up on the road. Your wheels shoot water out the back as it would in real life and makes a splash when you run over the puddles. This effect has yet to be mastered in any other game, giving PGR an edge.

This racer is great in the sound department. The engines sound real and roar to life at the start of the race. It makes it feel as if you were standing right by the cars as you play it. The wheels screech on the ground as you slide for turns and corners. Music is not a problem either. There are real radio stations and real DJ’s playing music as you drive. You can turn on a CD that has all of the 100+ songs in the game on it, or use your own customized soundtrack for the game. In a poll for one of the best sounding games, this should definitely be on the list.

Project Gotham plays simple yet is very complicated. To win in this game you must have and use these three things; speed, style, and skill. With all of these, you will earn Kudos for your racing style. The more Kudos you have the better. However, this game gets difficult before it gets fun. The higher you go in the game; the A.I. will drastically improve and win almost every time unless you have enough Kudos to unlock newer cars. Even when you unlock these new cars, they are still hard to beat. Also, the better the cars get, the harder they seem to get used to since you have to cope with their speed and turning abilities in order to win. Kudos make or break your experience with PGR. You don’t get enough of them, you won’t be happy later.

With the different variety of racers in the world today, it’s hard to find something new and fresh to throw into the market. Project Gotham just happens to be both a new and fresh experience. The Kudos system is what stands out from the rest. In most games, you only need speed in order to win. But with the Kudos system, it makes you work on all other aspects of your driving skills. Gran Turismo doesn’t offer this nor does Colin McKay. Project Gotham has a system that helps you work to become an amazing driver for any other racing game. This is one of the best racers around.

You race through more then 200 different circuits in New York, London, Tokyo, and San Francisco. There are over 25 high performance dream cars to unlock including the Ferrari F50, Porsche Boxster S, Corvette Z06, and Aston Martin Vanquish. There is a multi-player aspect to this game. You and up to three other friends can go head to head in an all out race. But this game lacks the support of the Xbox system link so you would have to play 4 players on one tiny screen for each. But overall there is at least 20+ hours of racing here. For only 20 dollars, how can you lose?

Graphics: 9
Sound: 9.5
Gameplay: 8
Creativity: 9.5
Replay Value/Game Length: 8.5
Final: 8.7
Written by Shawn Review Guide

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