Dangerous roads, people trying to kill you; Blur reminds me so much of Gauteng I cried a bit while playing for the first time.
Blur – A Mario Cart style racing game
I have been playing Forza 3 for some time now and was wondering how the super realistic racing simulator would compare to the more arcady Blur (arcady is a word right?)(No, Ed.). Where Forza tries to be as realistic as possible, Blur does not focus on realism at all, but on action.
To get you into the action as quickly as possible they toss you right into your first race, sans tutorial. I think this was a mistake because seconds into the race I realize I am in over my head.
Scattered across the race course are floating icons, each of which gives you a different power up. There are offensive power ups and defensive power ups. The problem is, not knowing what each icon does makes it difficult to pick up. Explosion abound, and not knowing what to do gets me assassinated one lap into my first race.
Desperate times call for desperate measures, and I am forced to do something that all gamers hate – read the manual. So I read the help file, memorize the controls and what all the different little icons mean and I am ready to race again.
Knowing what to do, the race goes better and I actually come in third. Guess what follows? A tutorial explaining what to do. So they throw you into the deep end, let you splash around a bit, and then reel you in to explain what’s what.
The tutorial gives you some more titbits and armed with more info I set off to race again.
Blur taps nicely into our current Zeitgeist by hooking the game into most of the social networks. You can post your achievements and race results on Twitter, Facebook and Xbox live. While this is a good way to promote the game, it’s also a good way to get you labeled as that guy who spams everyone.
Fun and longevity could be a problem in Blur. Not too far into the game they have introduced all there is to it, and all that is left is the mindless violence. Sweet, beautiful, mindless violence.
This is where we get to the Dan / Tarryn conundrum. First researched by Albert Einstein it is now discussed right here on mygaming.
On one hand you have a person that demands a bit more sophistication from their games, and on the other, a person who loves the relentless action and over the top stunts. Who is right? Who is wrong?
It is not about who is wrong, it is that they both are right and wrong at the same time. The game is wild, rough and fun but there is not too much variety in the gameplay. It is up to you decide what camp you fall into.
For me the game is enjoyable, I am a simple man and I enjoy simple pleasures (like setting someone’s car on fire). But will you like the game?
Ask yourself:
• Am I psycho?
• Does seeing somebody crash bring me great joy? *
If you answered yes to any of the above questions there is a good chance that you will enjoy Blur and the fact that there is not much variety in the gameplay will not bother you too much.
* You know I am talking about doing this inside game worlds and not in real life, right? RIGHT?!
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