Customer Rating:  
Summary: Best Car game ever. But get a decent PC
Comment: The game is amazing and you can literally drive for hours up mountains in the cities in exotic sports cars. You compete in races for money to buy new cars and houses etc.
Firstly here are my machine specs: AMD Athlon XP2400+, 896MB Ram, ATI Radeon X1650 Pro 256mb.
To get the game running OK on my machine - and by ok I mean 15-20 fps which is not great by any means but is playable (Apart from in cities where it drops at times to under 10 fps). I had to disable Details (Flying bits of paper and stuff which don't really add anything to the experience) and Traffic (which makes the game easier because the police aren't after you all the time!), AND set detail settings to LOW which just seems to change the draw distance - everything still looks amazing though.
I have come to the conclusion that this game is heavily dependent on CPU - a high end CPU is a must. For graphics it is still important but no point having a 8800GTS if you have a celeron or P2.4Ghz for this game. So I will be upgrading my PC in 6 months time to dual core top end with top Graphics card and love this game even more.
I haven't encountered any glitches or crashes in the game but then I am running on the recently released 1.66 patch.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Good
Comment: really addivtive. fine with vista i have got a saitek p-480 game pad from amazon and it makes it so much better.
a really good game but so addictive. it has so much driving abbilty. you can just drive anywhere. I found that it was a bit of a cross between the sims and a street racing game. i really love the mix and will never go back to ea games of need for speed
Customer Rating:
Summary: Nice game but so what?
Comment: it's pretty and it works, though I found controlling the cars much looser than say Need for Speed. The only problem is there's no real point to it. You drive around, enter races - though there is an annoying system of entry criteria, win money, buy clothes (!?) move house (?!?) and that's sort of it. The best feature is the fact that as the title suggests, you can test drive cars you can't afford.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Fun and stunning!
Comment: Some of you may have ready my scathing review of the PS2 version of this game, to those I can say that my opinion of the PC variety of this is infinitely better!
So, what's different from the platforms? As soon as you create your character you have the choice of several avatars, some of them female! Later, as you progress through the game you can change how they look, such as hair and facial features. Clothes can be bought using fashion tokens obtained from hitch-hikers or giving models a lift from the shops. You can also do courier mission against the clock, or transport someone else's car without getting it scratched for large amounts of cash, all of which not available in the PS2.
The number of cars is also greatly increased, with Atari releasing new cars in patches. The most notable additions to the list are Ferarri, Maserati, Audi, TVR and Superbikes like Ducati, Kawasaki and Triumph. Some PS2 cars like the soft-top Murchialago or Zonda are limited to beta testers, sometimes these can be seen on trade for several billions!
Driving is more of a pleasure than the PS2. You have 4 settings for the traction control and each has their own unique feel. Manual gearbox is a welcome option, and for those who take it seriously, an option to have manual clutch and `H-box' gearbox, but for these you really need the Logitech G25 racing wheel.
The game world of Oahu is rendered beautifully; even before turning the HDR effects on you get wonderful reflections on bodywork, excellent lighting effects and so much detail. The interior of the cars is fantastic, making you forgo the practicality of the other views for the visual treat.
Unless you decide to when creating your character you are always online, meaning it's easy to pull up in a car park and find some like-minded drivers and go for a cruise in your million dollar convoys. Single-player races also record times, so you can see how good you are compared to the other players. Atari have released a patch that has removed most of the hacks that had people covering 50 miles in less than 4 seconds with an E-type Jag.
It is a power-hungry little program though. My old Nvidia FX5600 was not up to the challenge and needed replacing. Luckily spending as little as £60 even for an AGP graphics card will get you very solid FPS, AA and a modest resolution.
For those bored with EA's boy-racer game this is a wonderfully welcome change. Get it and don't look back!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Best racer on the PC
Comment: I bought this game hoping it would be a nice alternative to Need for speed,it turned out to be a lot more than that.This is a very addictive game,you can while away a few hours on this without realizing.The scenery is the best i have ever seen,with draw distance that seems to let you see miles away.You are on the Hawaian island of O'ahu,there are miles and miles of roads to discover,the cars handle fairly well,not so much at slow speeds but much better at high speed.You can store 4 cars in your first house then as you earn more money you can buy houses that store 6,8 or 10 cars.
The online game works ok most of the time,ive encountered hundreds of drivers while playing this,there are parts of the island where players seem to hang out such as car parks and beaches so look out for those places.
Downsides - If your in a race (even a single player race) and your internet connection drops out for a second,you drop out the race,have to exit the game ,reconnect and then start the game again.
There are a few idiots online who insist on blaring distorted music through there mics and as you can type messages to each other,ive also encountered idiots who think its ok to hassle you with bad language if you beat them in a race,Bad Losers!
you wont regret playing this game,shame you have to play online all the time unless you want seperate profiles.if my internet connection goes down at any time i cant carry on my game.Havent touched NFSpeed since i bought this,i give it 9/10.
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