Burnout Crash! – Review
Platform | Release Date
PS3 | September 20, 2011
X360 | September 20, 2011
Developed by Criterion Games
Published by EA
The Pitch:
Criterion has gone back to their roots with Burnout™ CRASH! by bringing Burnout’s fan-favourite Crash mode to the forefront, adding new gameplay and exciting features to let players compete with their friends while embracing their road rage.
OK, full disclosure – I didn’t realize that Burnout Crash! was a Kinect game. I know, I know it says so right on the cover art, can’t I read? The problem is they had me at Crash! and so I hadn’t really read anything else about the game; I just knew I wanted to play it. Crash mode in previous Burnout
games was reason enough to purchase the game. The quick challenge and “just one more try” gameplay kept me coming back, trying to increase my “crash dollars” score for hours on end. Hell, even the lackluster, seemingly tacked on Showtime variation in Burnout Paradise had its moments of fun and the ability to challenge a friend’s score was still present. I naively thought that if you include quick bursts of gameplay, explosions, and a better way to keep track of friend scores, even with a new top-down perspective, how could Burnout Crash! Not be fun? I was sorely mistaken.
Burnout Crash! needs the Kinect peripheral for just one of its multiplayer modes which suited me well. I usually turn off my Kinect when not in use. It slows down the initial Xbox 360 start up and I am freaked out seeing my x-ray ghost image in the bottom right corner of my television screen. Other than this one multiplayer mode, a party affair, the game will play fine and actually better with just a controller.
After turning on the sensor and making the game happy, I was met with an uncharacteristically long load time for an XBLA title. In fact, it was so long I thought maybe I needed to turn the entire 360 off and turn it on again. Once it finally started I began to see some of the polish that Criterion is known for such as the Autolog feature I first encountered in last year’s Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit. For those that haven’t seen this in action, Autolog keeps track of how well friends are doing in a game and issues challenges based on a friend’s score beating yours on a particular track. In addition, friends are able to issue challenges of their own. Once a challenge is accepted, a player will be taken directly to that challenge to compete.
In theory, Autolog is a great feature and has the potential to keep crashers coming back night after night to see if there are any new 
challenges on the board. The only issue is Autolog assumes that you have friends playing the game. I have no friends, let alone any playing Burnout Crash! There were three on my friends list and we had been challenging one another back and forth. Sometime over the last few days, my friends got a call that there was a better party out there involving gears or war or something like that, and they are long gone leaving me with hollow victories as I top leaderboard after leaderboard. In short, Autolog only works when you have friends around.
There are three modes of play in Burnout Crash! Road trip is the first option on every playable intersection and by far the most frustrating. A player drives their vehicle into traffic and proceeds to rack up the crashes. The catch is if five vehicles leave the intersection or escape then the level is over. Each intersection also includes three bonuses that range from a police line of cars to block traffic, an airplane landing on the road and even an ambulance that can take away one of the red X’s a player receives when a car escapes the intersection. The bonuses are novel and there are many more than the ones I mentioned, but they feel more like the next scene in an amusement park ride for kids 48 inches tall and under, rather than bare knuckle action I expect in a game based on crashing into things.
The initial drive into traffic is slow. Holy conniption fit, it’s slow. The great thing about Burnout games usually is the sense of speed and the feeling that you’re teetering on the edge of all hell breaking loose. I never got that feeling playing Burnout Crash! In fact, often when playing Road Trip I experienced more a sense of helplessness as I watched cars meander by while I waited for my crash meter to fill. I now know what a turtle feels like when it’s turned upside down. I think I was supposed to feel urgency, but after the 4th or 5th time a car drives by and I am unable to react, I’m reassigned to my fate.
The other two modes and new vehicles will unlock based on the player’s Road Trip score and accumulation of stars. The Rush Hour mode unlocks next and is a welcome diversion from Road Trip. In 90 seconds a player tries to cause the biggest crash possible. The same is true of Pile Up with the difference being a multiplier that slowly builds to an ultimate inferno as the player tries to keep the fire alive, so to speak. More stars will also bring new levels that may be exciting or discouraging depending on the luck of the crash run. I have heard others compare the game to pinball. I think a better comparison is the haphazard challenge that a game of pachinko provides.
The Kinect controls warrant some discussion but not much. Hold an invisible wheel. Jump up. Move around to shift your exploding car. It’s about as fun as it sounds and I couldn’t convince my kids to continue using the Kinect controls after 2 or 3 attempts.
I’m sure it’s hard to tell because I keep my feelings tucked deep, deep inside but I’m disappointed. I still remember playing Burnout Revenge, passing the controller around during Thanksgiving and letting everyone, even Grandma, take a turn at trying to earn “crash dollars.” We would play that mode for hours. I would have been happy if Criterion had yanked that dated mode out of the 5-year-old Revenge, tacked on the Autolog and charged me 1200 Microsoft points. I would have handed over my cash to enjoy the thrill and speed that the original Revenge crash variation provides.
Sadly, Burnout Crash! is about as fun as a real car crash.
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While I do not own a Kinect, it is too bad this is the most recent memory of Burnout given how much I loved Paradise! If I don’t hear news about a sequel coming out soon(to Paradise) I think I will need to start worrying.
This is a severe disappointment for me. When Crash was first announced, it had significant promise but how in the world can Criterion create something bad? :/
I can see what happened clear as day. Someone at Criterion saw all the iOS knockoff and wanna be car games and said we can make a better one and as far as iOS games go they did just that. Heck, I still remember the first time I saw the screenshots. I remember thinking I want to play that iPhone game.
I can even imagine the controls. Slide forward or tilt forward to drive, tap or hit a button to crash and tilt or slide the iPad or iPhone to move into other cars. Put some form of autolog into that iOS version and I want to play it.
Someone convinced or coerced Criterion into putting this game on XBLA. That is my pure speculation opinion for which I have no basis. But I will stick by my conjecture to the death.
Conjecture, Jim, is inference or judgment based on inconclusive or incomplete evidence.
All these screenshots remind me of a really complex reiteration of Frogger. Maybe that would have been a better route for them to go…
Man, maybe it’s because I didn’t sleep well, or lack of coffee but I just looked at the 2nd screenshot and blurted out a hearty laugh when i saw “Press A to EXPLODE!”