From an early age, humans know that if they want to be taken seriously, they must learn how to deliver a convincing car noise. Vrrrrummm, they might say. Or perhaps: brrrrrr-bp-brrr. These are the nascent efforts of the budding speed freak, and they must be respected. But once again the realm of videogames encroaches upon the germinal life of the human with pitiless velocity. Car games put a stop to make-believe noise, and introduce fully realised cars on a screen, ready for the racing, shiny bonnets and vrrrrummm noises included. Thus, the imagination dies, and these, the 10 best cars in PC games, are born. Beep beep.
]]>Look, pal, for eleven years you've been promising to take me down to Paradise City, where the grass is green and the girls are pretty. Eleven long years of delayed plans and broken promises. Well, you better make good on it soon, because Criterion Games have announced that they will shut down the original Burnout Paradise's multiplayer servers in August. The open-world car 'em up will still be playable in singleplayer, and the recent Burnout Paradise Remastered won't be affected by this, but you promised to take me down to Paradise City, not Paradise City Remastered. Oh won't you please take me home?
]]>It has happened. The day spoken of in legend. After two years, I am finally to be set free of the Curse Of Steam Charts. All its taken is entirely leaving my job in four days time to end this purgatory. The only decision left is to whom I shall pass this vexation. That, and how to avoid mentioning the actual games for one more week. And this time I've come up with a self-indulgent doozy.
]]>Burnout Paradise was a brilliant arcade racing game with a so-so soundtrack and one utterly accursed feature - DJ Atomika. John vociferously lamented the continued existence the DJ in his review of the recent remastered re-release. While the remaster didn't change too much (though it did include some formerly console-exclusive DLC), this revised version is now the only way to play, thanks to this beautiful little mod, posted on Reddit by user "burninrubber0", the DJ Atomika Disabler does just what it says on the tin, and it's even multiplayer compatible.
]]>Burnout Paradise is one of my all-time favourite games. It's always in my top 5. I've bought it on multiple systems, multiple times. I come back to it more than any other game. And bloody hell, there are things I hate about it. Things that, for reasons beyond comprehension, EA have chosen to leave in the Remastered version.
]]>Open-world drive 'em up Burnout Paradise Remastered is drifting its way onto PC on August 21st – or it’s already parked up and ready for Origin Access and Premier users. As well as being all prettied up for its re-release, it’s launching with most of its bells and whistles, including bringing the Big Surf Island DLC to PC for the first time.
]]>Criterion's fab open-world racer Burnout Paradise is getting fancied up for a re-release later this year, Electronic Arts announced today, ten years after its original launch. Burnout Paradise Remastered, as it's named, is prettified and whatnot, and will include most of the DLC - including the Big Surf Island expansion that skipped PC the first time. Burnout Paradise is good. This new is good. Sadly our version is coming after the console release, but I am still well up for this. Here, look at this announcement trailer:
]]>In most cases, driving, and this is true of both real life and games, is about the act of getting from point A to point B with your car. It’s about doing it efficiently, safely, and in as little time as possible. In games, your vehicle of choice might be a car with a jet engine under the hood and even a drive from place to place might be somewhat risky, but the point remains - just get from here to there, usually before your rivals.
One of Burnout Paradise’s greatest achievements is allowing you to do something else entirely. You can, and are encouraged to, just get behind the wheel and drive, without enemies, timers, or competition.
]]>The RPS gang sits around in our secret treehouse every day, chatting about the things we'd like to post more of to the site. One of those things is, "Nice things what we read/watched/heard elsewhere on the internet." Sure, we already have the Sunday Papers, but wouldn't this be a more interesting, enlightening, day-brightening corner of the internet if we occasionally pointed and yelled, "Look over there!"
So here, look at YouTube series Game Maker's Toolkit. Particularly, look at this video of Mark Brown explaining what Mirror's Edge Catalyst should have learned from Burnout Paradise.
]]>Have You Played? is an endless stream of game recommendations. One a day, every day of the year, perhaps for all time.
How have I not covered Burnout Paradise already in the HYP archives?! It’s been in my top five all-time games since its release in 2008, and remains my favourite driving game of all time. The game I’ve gone back to more than any other, apart from maybe Freecell.
]]>Welcome to our Let's Not Play of Burnout Paradise. This is a series in which we discover the fun to be had in obsessively refusing to play games properly. Apparently Burnout Paradise features races, challenges and cars to collect. But ignore all that! To not play Burnout Paradise is to SMASH EVERYTHING! Don't even bother collecting any other cars other than the starting one! I wrote about how brilliant doing this was six years ago. I continue to find it brilliant. Here are the first 200 yellow fences and 50 billboards destroyed, while I natter rubbish over the top.
]]>Fiona Sperry and Alex Ward have left the company they founded, Criterion Games. The EA subsidiary has gone through some major changes recently, starting in September 2013 when the majority of its employees were moved over to a new studio called Ghost Games. That team is focused on the continued development of the Need for Speed series, while Criterion's remaining 17 employees set about creating something new codenamed 'Project Zero'.
Why should you care, I defensively imagine you asking.
]]>When talk of racing games comes up, I'm one of those people. "I DON'T REALLY LIKE RACING GAMES BUT BURNOUT'S GREAT," I blurt. And then some people sigh dejectedly and resume their debates about cylinders and dinosaur liquids while a precious few join me in discussing rad crashes that mangle metal into fiery explosion pretzels. And that's how I make friends. So now we arrive at Need For Speed: Most Wanted. Normally, I wouldn't even give this series the time of day, but apparently, someone forgot to tell Criterion it was making a Need For Speed game. So it made Burnout Paradise 2 instead. And I wept. But just a little. In a cool way. You can do the same with this video of NFSMW's open world in action. Otherwise, we might not be able to be friends.
]]>Edit: Still working after all! But you have to 'buy' it and apply the code via the Origin client, not the website. UK only, by the sounds of things.
]]>400 smashes and 120 billboards smashed, it's crashed again. And I'm secretly hoping it will have taken my save game with it for a second time. I've got a horrible feeling I'll end up starting a new save game otherwise, just so I can smash everything again. I have a bit of a problem, and it involves Burnout Paradise.
]]>Criterion are plugging the next addition due for Burnout: Paradise, a Cops & Robbers game. I'm really pleased that Criterion are delivering on extra content for the already superb game. New stuff seems to be arriving all the time. And best of all, the biggest stuff has been completely free, including new game modes, and an entire alternate version of the game for motorbikes. Less pleasing are some of the astonishing prices they've charged for the smaller updates. The recent "Toys" pack, which gives you nine new super-cute cars to muck about in, costs an incredible £10 for the "value" version. Or perhaps you fancy sending £6 on getting just two new cars with extra boost? So how much will Cops & Robbers cost? There's a video of it below to see if you want to smash your piggy bank.
]]>Burnout Paradise was released last week on PC, via a gigantic time-limited demo. It was one of the most popular console games of last year, thanks to its open-world racing model. But is it any good? Here's Wot I Think.
Playing Burnout Paradise on PC was rather like biting into a large, delicious sandwich, filled with quality meats and condiments. Sadly the first bite revealed that the sandwich also contained an elastic band. Once the inedible foreign article had been spat out, and cuss words uttered, the meal was delicious. After all, this is one of my favourite sandwiches. And I am so very, very hungry.
]]>I can see it in your eyes. You want to download a 2.9GB demo. No, really, you do. Because ta-da, the PC release of Burnout: Paradise goes shopward in the morning, and entire game is available to download, for free, in a time-limited way. Perhaps from Fileshack, perhaps from GamersHell. Or maybe from NVidia. (Actually, the servers are crazy busy at the moment, and hopefully they'll be echoed in a few more places. Post links below if you find them - but please, no torrents unless officially sanctioned.)
]]>Criterion's maniac open-world racer was one of my favourite console games last year, and the "Ultimate" edition also comprises a bran-spanking PC version, which is out February 5th/6th. The trailer after the jump, then, acts as a useful teaser for our Windows version of the game, while featuring console footage. It's fairly safe to say that super-hi res PC visuals will make it look even more spectacular. Word has it that there's a PC demo in the works too, which will be a timed and feature-locked version of the full game. I'll be all over that.
One of the consolation games I played most regularly in the past year was Burnout Paradise. It's a freeform racing game across a wide-open, pedestrian-devoid urbanscape. A little like GTA4 without people, and with far better crash happenings, it entranced me for many hours. I found myself consistently entertained by the absurd cross-city racing, and the dynamic way in which you smashed violently into automobiles and immovable objects alike. It is a game that would probably be described as "hi-octane" on the cover of a magazine, and would worry your mother by becoming a source of endless vehicular-collision amusements. Look at those automobiles bend and shatter in slow-motion!
Yes. The game is heading for the personal computer platform in February 2009, and it's the "ultimate" pack, including most of the previously released Burnout Paradise content, including bikes. After the jump: an horrendous car-wreck compilation movie.
]]>Unexpected but not unwelcome, Shacknews are reporting that Criterion are bringing the latest version of their console racer to the PC. More details will be forthcoming, but they're talking about improved online stuff and community-driven content. The last one strikes me as the interesting on. Burnout Paradise, in its open city with seamless multi-player play, is an interesting space for the community to create.
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