DriveClubDrive Together, Win Together
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7/10
James Daive |
DEV: Evolution Games
PUB: Sony Computer Entertainment
RELEASE DATE: 08/10/2014
FORMAT: PS4
Racing games are beginning to stagnate in the procedural bind of veering towards simulation, rather than the frolics produced by the arcade style of driving, most predominantly found in Mario Kart, Need For Speed and many other prolific racing games. DriveClub is unashamedly sim-based and boy-oh-boy does it make this fact apparent. Penalties and careful driving are rewarded, accomplishing objectives nets you progress, and like many other racers in this profoundly new generation- offers up a community substratum for all your racing highlights and lap times to be viewed and challenged at your leisure. Generally speaking, DriveClub might be a no-thrills simulation racer with nothing new for some, but it’s also an accessible and beautiful racer, especially for those who crave online competition.
The allure of DriveClub is racing through verdant country roads, drifting on the edge of control around the coils of tarmac wrapped around pristine mountain peaks, and jostling for position down furiously long stretches of tarmac, seeing you tussle and scrape for every inch of forward momentum you can muster, whilst tearing the steering wheel in the desired direction to keep you from hurtling and tumbling into a barrier of frustration. Races across Europe present an impressive diversity of tracks, each very scenic and pose as great intangible landscapes to behold and stare at as you drag your eyes away from the road and unto its sheer elegance. Beauty is only carbon-fibre deep however, as the slim modes on offer can attest to.
The crux of the single player experience boils down to a lengthy yet vapid world tour mode, comprised of races across varying landscapes in India, Chile, Scotland, Norway Japan and Canada, where the aim is to earn enough stars and fans, in order to gain access to the next tier of difficulty. Each race has a couple of objectives for you to complete, which forego the cliché of demanding you win every race, but instead challenges you to complete objectives like beating a drifting, cornering or average speed high score. These provide an admirable change to the clear-cut formula of mindlessly transitioning from one race to the next, but DriveClub rigidly obligates you to complete these tasks to gain entry into the higher rungs of difficulty later on, making them a repetitive necessity and forcing the races to have one-note thrills each and every time. Upon completion of races, you will gain XP and will be able to unlock new, usually very fast vehicles for you to road test and use as and when you like. The cars are primarily European and there aren’t too many of them. Couple this with the streamlined diversification of these vehicles; DriveClub fails to flaunt itself promisingly next to the Gran Torismos and Forzas of the world, making it an anaemic alternative to the latter and the former.
PUB: Sony Computer Entertainment
RELEASE DATE: 08/10/2014
FORMAT: PS4
Racing games are beginning to stagnate in the procedural bind of veering towards simulation, rather than the frolics produced by the arcade style of driving, most predominantly found in Mario Kart, Need For Speed and many other prolific racing games. DriveClub is unashamedly sim-based and boy-oh-boy does it make this fact apparent. Penalties and careful driving are rewarded, accomplishing objectives nets you progress, and like many other racers in this profoundly new generation- offers up a community substratum for all your racing highlights and lap times to be viewed and challenged at your leisure. Generally speaking, DriveClub might be a no-thrills simulation racer with nothing new for some, but it’s also an accessible and beautiful racer, especially for those who crave online competition.
The allure of DriveClub is racing through verdant country roads, drifting on the edge of control around the coils of tarmac wrapped around pristine mountain peaks, and jostling for position down furiously long stretches of tarmac, seeing you tussle and scrape for every inch of forward momentum you can muster, whilst tearing the steering wheel in the desired direction to keep you from hurtling and tumbling into a barrier of frustration. Races across Europe present an impressive diversity of tracks, each very scenic and pose as great intangible landscapes to behold and stare at as you drag your eyes away from the road and unto its sheer elegance. Beauty is only carbon-fibre deep however, as the slim modes on offer can attest to.
The crux of the single player experience boils down to a lengthy yet vapid world tour mode, comprised of races across varying landscapes in India, Chile, Scotland, Norway Japan and Canada, where the aim is to earn enough stars and fans, in order to gain access to the next tier of difficulty. Each race has a couple of objectives for you to complete, which forego the cliché of demanding you win every race, but instead challenges you to complete objectives like beating a drifting, cornering or average speed high score. These provide an admirable change to the clear-cut formula of mindlessly transitioning from one race to the next, but DriveClub rigidly obligates you to complete these tasks to gain entry into the higher rungs of difficulty later on, making them a repetitive necessity and forcing the races to have one-note thrills each and every time. Upon completion of races, you will gain XP and will be able to unlock new, usually very fast vehicles for you to road test and use as and when you like. The cars are primarily European and there aren’t too many of them. Couple this with the streamlined diversification of these vehicles; DriveClub fails to flaunt itself promisingly next to the Gran Torismos and Forzas of the world, making it an anaemic alternative to the latter and the former.
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The staleness of the race objectives translates over to the driving core as well. Were it not for the impressively nuanced driving model, giving the player a tremendous sense of feedback across its varied and beautiful catalogue of automobiles, DriveClub would be totally devoid of any purposeful meaning. The rules and abstract nature of the scenery reminds the player that he or she can only speed across tarmac in a linear and narrow way, because Evolution Studios has seen fit to make this sim racer not much fun to play. DriveClub prefers precision to recklessness, but struggles to maintain its set of rules, in an attempt to perhaps make it more enjoyable and less frustrating. You may find that a partial scrape momentarily disengages the speed of your car, but when a large pummelling shunt enforces no such penalty on you, you begin to question why Evolution Studios-famed for the offroad frolics of the Motorstorm series-even bothered. There is the arcade tendency prevalent in most racing games, to turn you around or give you a three second timer to return to the track before it takes control away from you for a split-second, to basically tell you to drive properly or go and play a better game, so at least it takes itself seriously where it matters- making sure those meandering game breakers get put on the right track.
Maybe it’s too harsh to criticize DriveClub for its many faults, as there is a smattering of things it gets totally right. The online community it has forged elevates competition in a very successful and addictive manner. You can join various clubs and represent them by taking on challenges other clubs have sent, or you can challenge your own club members for all the bragging rights, giving the competitive nature of racing a hugely satisfying base for you and your friends to tuck into. Drifting, especially the litany of challenges dedicated to the sliding art, is also raucously engaging once you have it down, but with every sim-racer including drifting modes and challenges, you may feel it doesn’t do enough to distinguish itself from other racing games. The collisions and the paintwork scratches are decently rendered, and though it never reaches for Burnout levels of bodywork deformation, the wear and tear on your vehicle does become distracting to notice when you’re in the middle of a race. The sense of speed is fascinating too as you’re always prone to the risk of spinning out like a frisby caught in the draft of a tornado, making duels down long stretches of road in a ferocious fight for first an invigorating endeavour. As too is the frightening immersion of racing at night time, barely seeing corners as you encroach upon them, constantly weary of the space you have in front of you. There are many instances where DriveClub exposes its flashes of brilliance, and it’s within these moments DriveClub becomes more than just another racing game touting noteworthy online additions.
There can be no overstating how voluptuous DriveClub looks. The car models are chunky but extremely well designed and modelled, the interior view being especially worthy of plaudits. The dynamic range lighting does its best to blind you as you exit tunnels, as well as momentarily confusing you when entering them- ensuring you feel that much closer to the action. The sound design is freakishly pleasing, the low-pitched groans and roars of each engine and the fading in and out of sound as you enter and exit tunnels is gratifying. More satiations await you if you sample the downloadable content, where you can slip and slide through wet weather trials, adding unbelievably seductive effects that’ll leave you totally bamboozled as to how the game could look any better than it already does.
Maybe it’s too harsh to criticize DriveClub for its many faults, as there is a smattering of things it gets totally right. The online community it has forged elevates competition in a very successful and addictive manner. You can join various clubs and represent them by taking on challenges other clubs have sent, or you can challenge your own club members for all the bragging rights, giving the competitive nature of racing a hugely satisfying base for you and your friends to tuck into. Drifting, especially the litany of challenges dedicated to the sliding art, is also raucously engaging once you have it down, but with every sim-racer including drifting modes and challenges, you may feel it doesn’t do enough to distinguish itself from other racing games. The collisions and the paintwork scratches are decently rendered, and though it never reaches for Burnout levels of bodywork deformation, the wear and tear on your vehicle does become distracting to notice when you’re in the middle of a race. The sense of speed is fascinating too as you’re always prone to the risk of spinning out like a frisby caught in the draft of a tornado, making duels down long stretches of road in a ferocious fight for first an invigorating endeavour. As too is the frightening immersion of racing at night time, barely seeing corners as you encroach upon them, constantly weary of the space you have in front of you. There are many instances where DriveClub exposes its flashes of brilliance, and it’s within these moments DriveClub becomes more than just another racing game touting noteworthy online additions.
There can be no overstating how voluptuous DriveClub looks. The car models are chunky but extremely well designed and modelled, the interior view being especially worthy of plaudits. The dynamic range lighting does its best to blind you as you exit tunnels, as well as momentarily confusing you when entering them- ensuring you feel that much closer to the action. The sound design is freakishly pleasing, the low-pitched groans and roars of each engine and the fading in and out of sound as you enter and exit tunnels is gratifying. More satiations await you if you sample the downloadable content, where you can slip and slide through wet weather trials, adding unbelievably seductive effects that’ll leave you totally bamboozled as to how the game could look any better than it already does.
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DriveClub plays it safe with a flurry of scenic racecourses and a myriad of gorgeous cars, overtaking the tenets of the gameplay, showing little variety, very few innovations and not a lot of poise. Yet DriveClub has an excellent online infrastructure, letting players better themselves by taking on challenges made by clubs, and being able to issue them to and throw with every element of racing honed to support these multiplayer aspects. Furthermore, the excellent driving mechanics and the audio-visual sensations welcomes DriveClub into the current generation, knowing exactly how to give the Playstation audience a gravitating alternative to the multitude of shooters and action adventures presently fettering the marketplace. DriveClub is indeed worthy of your time, just know it demands conformity with its rules and lack of mode types to truly savour.
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+ Great online infrastructure where membership breeds competitiveness and challenge,
+ Beautiful weather and particle effects, an immersive sound design that truly enthrals, + Vehicle handling is smooth as to be expected, making for entertaining racing gameplay. - Reliance on rules and clean driving detract from the spirit of racing, - Game types are disappointingly shallow, no creativity shown in any of its content, - Career mode is a slog with objectives repeating themselves constantly, making the races feel routine, lacking in eventfulness. |
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