NASCAR '14by Matt Taylor
Format Reviewed on; PS3 |
Developers; Eutechnyx
Publisher; Deep Silver Formats; Available PC, PS3, XBox360 Release Date; Out now |
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Growing up in Australia, NASCAR is not exactly something that impacted me. Instead I grew up watching the V8 Supercars, the local touring car series. Unbeknownst to me, the first time I was introduced to NASCAR was with Sega’s Daytona USA arcade machines. In every bowling alley, arcade or football club; Daytona USA would entice players with its hard plastic bucket seat, loud music and four speed gear stick. Daytona USA was also the first time most people saw a full 3D world, helping it to be (and remain) one of the most memorable racing games of all time. Since then my experience with the sport itself was very limited but I understood the concept. Drive extremely fast for a long time. NASCAR is a sport of endurance, nerves and mechanical prowess.
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Developed by Eutechnyx, NASCAR ‘14 is the third game in the “NASCAR The Game” racing simulator series. With NASCAR ‘14, you feel like someone managing your own racing team, customising the car with elaborate configurations and changing it’s appearance to suit your taste. The game is a simulator to the core, but it feels like they managed to capture the minute details and tedium of a touring car team, without managing to hold onto what makes racing games fun: the racing.
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Creating my driver and driving team, I stepped into the Career mode which takes the player and his team through their rookie season and beyond. You begin with the basics, with clear upgrade paths that will take your car from refurbished junker to state-of-the art racing machine. As a rookie, money is tight, with sponsors only showing interest after better placings. In the simulator spirit, the car can be completely customised. This isn’t Need for Speed or even Gran Turismo level customisation, this is down to the millimeter stuff. This game is made for NASCAR and racing enthusiasts who care about and understand the finer arts of camber and wheel adjustments. You need to know what you are doing and need to know what changes to make. Sadly, I lack these skills and chose the default configuration, going through the early part of the season with a stock set-up.
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Most of the tracks are the classic oval or a variation, with one or two choosing a more “international” flavour which feature chicanes and right hand turns. In all of the races I played through I’d end up in the same place before the race: qualify first and ending up in pole position. Racing on these tracks is all about getting into a groove, which is simplified with the driver assist options that are aimed at allowing new and inexperience players access to the game before it reveals it’s deeper levels. I could race well by myself, with a mixture of throttle control and braking, following the on screen prompts to victory. Qualifying first was the easy part. Leading a pack of 42 AI controlled players was where things came apart for me.
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The racing itself is simple, but being surrounded on all sides by cars travelling at top speed, defending against other drivers and using a terribly sensitive control scheme unravelled me. NASCAR ‘14 is an excellent racing simulator but is a terrible racing game.
This game must have been made with steering wheel peripheral use in mind. It’s almost impossible to maintain a straight line with a dualshock controller. The game has it’s own steering assist which fails to make a controller feel useful, with the only solution to hold the analog stick in an “up” position, rotating it around to the direction that I needed my car to turn. With every inch counting in the tightly packed group of drivers maintaining a smooth line was almost impossible, and I found myself “cheating” by veering into the other players and frightening the AI into the wall.
This game must have been made with steering wheel peripheral use in mind. It’s almost impossible to maintain a straight line with a dualshock controller. The game has it’s own steering assist which fails to make a controller feel useful, with the only solution to hold the analog stick in an “up” position, rotating it around to the direction that I needed my car to turn. With every inch counting in the tightly packed group of drivers maintaining a smooth line was almost impossible, and I found myself “cheating” by veering into the other players and frightening the AI into the wall.
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Cheating my way to the front of the pack, I would find myself rammed off the road by computer controlled drivers that seemed to be following a path, with no regards to whatever stood in their way. Sitting in the top 10 and being shunted off the road by a oblivious driver was infuriating, with it made worse by the games hit and miss detection of the “yellow flag” system. For the safety of the drivers in the race, an accident should be followed by a yellow flag. This brings out the safety teams to clear the track of debris, which is followed by a pace car and the drivers lining up in their previous places to begin a rolling start. Far often than not, this system would work one time and not the next. You’d fight for control of your car one minute and the yellow flag would show itself, next I’d find myself slammed into the wall, facing the wrong way, dropping from 3rd to 42nd without a yellow flag in sight. As a player, you rely on the yellow flag to save you from an illegal move taking you from first to last. The mechanic needed to work for the game to seem reliable and consistent, but it failed too many times for me to mention.
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My best results were obtained through cheating the game. I’d win a race by frightening drivers into crashing and be rewarded with a new sponsor and more money. It’s possible that the developers have focused so heavily on the simulation part of NASCAR ‘14, that they forgot to invest enough time on the racing elements. Or maybe NASCAR ‘14 is the truest simulation of the sport, and cheating your way to the front without any regards for life is the essence of NASCAR.
This game is made for someone who wants to control every element of their racing team. The person who has a spread sheet of ride height adjustments. This is not a racing game. This is a simulator that captures the tedium and intricacy of racing.
This game is made for someone who wants to control every element of their racing team. The person who has a spread sheet of ride height adjustments. This is not a racing game. This is a simulator that captures the tedium and intricacy of racing.
Rating |
3/5 |
Review cop Provided by Publisher
Images courtesy of Deep Silver
Images courtesy of Deep Silver
