Burnout Paradise (Sony Playstation 3, 2008)

The Graphics are awesome and the game play is smooth. Lots of different cars to unlock and lots of ways to unlock them. Crashes look cool, but I wish they didn’t switch you to a different viewing mode and slow the whole game down when they happen. The open environment is very different from the old burnout games, but it can get you sucked in four hours. Getting new cars is cool and customizing them at the junk yard is fun. Upgrading your burnout license can get tedious because you have to drive around town searching for events to win and when you do upgrade all your completed events get cleared and reset so you can never really tell if you have done everything or if you are just doing the same things over and over again. There is definitely more to this game than just racing; the takedown, stunt, ShowTime, and explore modes certainly mix it up. Exploring the map can get old though because it’s a pretty big area. Some of the events are not very well explained so it can be frustrating trying to figure out how to make things happen or achieve certain goals. The load time when you start the game is long, but in game loads are fairly quick.
Overall, great game and a lot of fun to play.
Biggest downer is its only one(1)player off-line. No off-line multiplayer, so you can’t play at home with anybody else unless you are connected to the internet.
If it had an offline multiplayer mode I would upgrade it to a rating of “excellent”

It's easy to sit behind a computer and write your opinion based on frustrations from either being a crappy player or having a crappy TV or who know what other reason you might have for being disgruntled while writing a review. But even all of you grinches out there have to admit that BO: Paradise ROCKS! Solid game-play, solid handling, accurate physics, great graphics, the crash slow-motion engine is out of this world, but a little annoying if you're parking you car up every pole on the street. Sound effects are awsome, the surround is immersing to say the least. The map. The map is great, a lot of tracks, a lot of races, a ton of events, hidden paths everywhere (did my first quad-barrell-roll!) All of the event types really get you hooked, from races, to road rage, to marked man, burning routes, everything is designed in a manner in which you'll have to stop only to recharge your controller. The music is awsome (for who ever is into this kind of music), the audio processor is accurate, the mixing is crisp, effects blend into music flawlessly, unlike other games. EA outdone itself with this one, and I think that this time the long-awaited NFS: Pro Street title will be second-best after BO: Paradise. The platform seems to be the same as NFS but this time, the skater-dudes came out from behind the lines and stepped up to the plate. BO: Paradise is one of the best games I have played so far, and I predict at least 6-8 months of game-play, at which time, I'm either gonna break my controller, get carpel-tunnel, or toss my TV out the window. Thinkin of a way to bring my PS3 to work. All you guys and gals, enjoy this great title.

The new installment in the burnout series really just adds a better game than what came before it, the open world is fun to drive around and there is so much to do it will take forever to finish. Altough they removed the crash mode they created showtime which i am liking more and more but thats just my opinion. it can be difficult to find your way to the end point during a race but it is meant to have many different routes to the end so to have way points would kind of defeat the purpose i guess. The graphics are awesome, the challenges are fun and the online is good but would have like to see more than 8 players allowed per room. In short if you like the burnout series you will love this game, its different but much better IMO, Criterion is still the best at crash sequences as the prove again here. Enjoy

I'm a long time fan of the burnout series, and I've had my eye on this latest installment of the game for quite a while. Bottom line is, if you liked the other games games, you'll feel right at home with this one. It's a great looking game, and as you'd expect from a burnout game, there's still that amazing sense of speed no matter what car or truck you're driving. The races themselves will take you a little time to adjust to. This time around, the team at EA has placed you in an open city in which all of your races take place. There are no more transparent yellow boundaries to guide you thorough the race, but a gps-like compass with a nav point that you can choose to follow or not. Lots of room for shortcuts this way, but definitely a little disorienting at first. There are a ton of races from what I can tell (though I've only had the game a few days now), so it will keep you busy for a while.
Perhaps the biggest disappointment for me was the exclusion of the crash mode that we knew and loved from the last two burnout games. There's a new mode called showtime where you wreck your car and then steer your bouncing wreck to try and damage the traffic around you and sustain a combo for as long as you can. But no more launching your car off of ridiculous ramps and sitting back to watch the ensuing chaos. This new mode just doesn't do it for me, and it got old pretty quickly.And they got rid of the crashbreaker, the one real contrubution burnout revenge made to the series.
Overall, the game is fun, fundamentally still a burnout game, and it looks great on the ps3. If you get a chance you might download the demo from the PS store, but I really don't think the demo does the game justice, as its too limiting and you don't get a feel for the scope of paradise city from the three or so races they include and the road blocks everywhere that cut off the rest of the city in the demo.

This game is fun. It's the best driving game so far for the PS3. The graphics are incredible and even though the cars are fictional, they look like real production cars. The engines, carbon fiber, body panels look very realistic. Gameplay is realistic and all cars can be damaged and repaired. I like the fact that you don't have to enter a garage and leave gameplay to fix the car. The game features drive thrus that can repair, paint, and supply boost fuel to the cars on the fly. Even during events. The city is very intricate and has tons of shortcuts.

I don't like how you have to actually drive to the events on the map. Once you have most of them completed, the remaining ones take a long time to get to cause they're on the other side of the humongous city. In the game you achieve liscences by completing a number of races required. Once you achieve a liscense, all of the races that you won are cleared and you have to do them over again for the next liscense. it's annoying. The game doesn't have any plot or story. But, then again, none of the burnout series have had a plot. You just drive aroung. And it is very easy to get lost in the city because it is so intricate.

Overall I thought this game is pretty good. The little annoying things like driving to events instead of selecting them from a menu or lack of plot are easily outwieghed by the detail and graphics that Critereon put into the game. It is eye candy and if you like realistic driving games, then you should enjoy this one.