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Dangerous Driving is a game for which I saw the trailer and thought – “This looks like Burnout! And it looks like the Burnout we should’ve had when Burnout Paradise was originally released, and it was a bit ‘meh'”.
Basically, we needed an HD version of Burnout 3 and Burnout Revenge – the two best entries in the series by that point… and to date… before Dangerous Driving came along.
From the start, I was feeling extreme exhilaration, even just while sat down in a chair. This is a phenomenal feeling I have not had since playing Burnout Revenge.
As Ted Hastings would say in Line of Duty, “Now, we’re sucking diesel!”
You’ll always end up lagging behind when a race starts, but you’ll gain boost by taking cars down or speeding in the oncoming lane as well as getting close shaves. Amongst the frenetic pace, you can clearly hear when someone’s coming up behind or alongside you, so you can take evasive action, such is the great audio in this title. Of course, in a car game, you’ll mostly just hear fairly standard car sounds, but that’s to be expected in something like this, so it’s not even a downside, really.
This is not an easy game, and it won’t be the case that you’ll be getting Gold on your first trip round the race track, bar the odd fluke. It will take a good few attempts at each track to learn the twists and turns, and learn how to adapt so you can take advantage of every bend and every straight, not to mention the persistent wrecks of other cars which stay on the road so you can crash again thanks to those being left in the way. So there’s a great deal of replay value in this.
Road Rage is one of the challenges, in which you can perform multiple takedowns in a row, as you knock other cars off the road.
In the Heatwave challenges, for some reason, it does take a bit longer for the boost to kick in (usually, it’s after going against the traffic for 100m, but here, it’s a further target, and one that’s seemingly random), but once you manage it, keep the boost on for as long as you can manage it, since you’ll get additional boosts (‘Heatwaves’, which you can chain one after another). The trick is to avoid the traffic and even grind along the barriers at the side – safely, i.e. not by ramming into them head-on. Now, I just need to perfect this trick so I don’t crash!
Once you crash, the opposition zooms ahead and it’s a frustrating wait for the boost to kick in again. The Tuned Sedan is best for this (although I had to complete the NEXT race in the list – Face Off 2 – in other to obtain it), as it adds on 2mph for each chained heatwave you accomplish (i.e. without crashing), and I managed 9 of them.
Dangerous Driving – Gameplay footage Playlist (PC, 1080p HD) – DVDfeverGames
However, the only race I usually keep missing out on completing is… the Shakedown Preview. I’m not quite sure why that one has to be so damn hard, but for one of them (Preview 1 on SUV Class), I played it for around two hours and still didn’t reach the finish line. I suck! …but then on Preview 2, I won Gold second time around.
At the point of posting this review, so far, I have gone through the Sedan and SUV classes. I’ve put up gameplay footage for a lot of these so far, with more to come, all of which will be added to the playlist.
I played this on PC, but for the console versions, unless you’re using a PS4 Pro or Xbox One X, you’ll be limited to 30fps which will be annoying, since 60fps is really the way to go with this game, in order to capture that incredible feeling.
If you want music, Spotify has been integrated into the game for a soundtrack, but personally, I’m recording gameplay to put online and I don’t want copyright claims aplenty, so I’ve taken the tunes out for my gameplay. Many moons ago, when I used to enjoy a blast of Midtown Madness 3 on the original Xbox, I would put in my CD of the best David Bowie album ever made – Never Let Me Down. Yes, *I LOVED IT* !!!! You know who didn’t? David Bowie, himself. I so wish I could tell him how much I played it and how wonderful it still sounds 32 years on.
However, there is just one thing missing… Crash Mode. I’m sure that can be added with DLC, and I know some free DLC is planned, but unless there was a legal reason for leaving it out, it does feel like a missed opportunity.
Well, something else is missing, too – I wish it would tell me how many metres is left on any particular lap, since some of them are short, and some go on for 4-5 minutes, and that may not sound like a long time, but it’s plenty of time to crash over and over….
Oh, and if you’re looking for multiplayer, this is due to come within one month of the game’s release. While I normally just go for single-player, I might actually give this a go in this game, as I did enjoy that in Midtown Madness 3, back in the day.
Dangerous Driving is out now on PS4, Xbox One and PC.
Important info:
- Developer: Three Fields Entertainment
- Publisher: Maximum Games
- Players: single player, multiplayer
- Languages: English
- Subtitles: None
Dangerous Driving – Trailer – Three Fields Entertainment
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GRAPHICS SOUND GAMEPLAY ENJOYMENT |
10 8 10 10 |
| OVERALL | 9.5 |
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.