NASCAR 08

July 31,2007 - NASCAR 08 makes its jump to the next-gen and it seems to have hit a few bumps along the way. The game takes a different approach to its career mode, called The Chase, which seems more like a step backward than real progress for the game’s appeal. Throw in a questionable default steering mechanic and it’s really hard to figure out who the developers really intended to appeal to with their latest game.

The big attraction for pretty much any sports game these days is the big career or franchise mode that will comprise the majority of your single-player gaming time. However, NASCAR 08’s The Chase mode requires a lot of the gamer just to get into the big races that you generally buy the game for. First, you need to get a license, which requires completing a series of ten tests that range from simple to challenging just to have the opportunity to get your own car to take to The Chase. There are six licenses here that have to be completed just to be able to race every race during the season, as each license only allows you to race on a few tracks, at the most. Then you need to impress the owners of the car attached to that license to be signed to a contract to race the car in The Chase by doing well in a few races per contract. These races don’t result in money or anything worthwhile, just the contract that allows you to race on a couple of tracks during the season. Once you’ve got a car, it’s time to finally get to the fun part.

That’s just one part of the game that makes it seem like the developers expected NASCAR 08 to appeal to newcomers to the NASCAR series, as you’re not doing much more than completing a bunch of tutorials that veterans don’t want to be forced to do just to play the fun part. The next conflicting part of the game is the most important part of the game, the steering control settings. It is way too loose to be able to do well without a ton of patience more than the average gamer will have to find the “fun” here. The settings must be changed, particularly the responsiveness setting, first to even have a chance to really enjoy the game, otherwise you’ll powerslide into walls like you accidentally bought a Ridge Racer game instead. The rest of the in-race gameplay works well, even being a nice improvement over previous games with the amount of HUD options at your disposal and attention to the details in rules with the inclusion of green-white-checkered flags and the lucky dog award that add a nice touch that NASCAR fans will enjoy. The AI works well for the most part, though there are some strange times where they act up and ignore your presence on the track, but it’s not a constant issue that seems to plague each race.

However, with all of this work required to just to get to the big enchilada that the game offers, it’s likely that most will just give up all together or try to find fun in the other modes that are less restricting. The season mode’s likely to be where The Chase survivors will go for some fun, if they stick around at all. The online mode offers a lot of fun and race options to better customize the races you’d like to participate in for online racing action. The badges add some replay value, allowing you to earn badges of each driver provided you complete the requirements on the badge, such winning a certain amount of races and winning a race at a certain track.

Visually, NASCAR 08 fits the next-gen truck quite nicely, though it goes deeper than just the outside. Damage is done quite nicely here, as bumping the bumper of your opponent in front of you quick deforms the bumper along with various other methods of scratching up the paint and deforming various parts of the cars that look very nice for a NASCAR game. It’s rather easy to even flip cars, which not only looks cool, but can knock other cars off course to do various things themselves. The tracks are nicely detailed, from the track itself to the stands and crowds themselves, which provides for a very nice atmosphere that is necessary for the game to succeed. There are a lot of options for the HUD this year, which provides a lot of information at once that helps you get an idea of how you’re driving affects the car to help you become a better driver. The draft wake has to be the coolest visual cue, which lets you see the drafts left by other cars and turns from blue to green to let you know when you can slingshot past that driver.

Where any racing game really needs to succeed is in the audio department, where NASCAR 08 manages to succeed quite well. The loud cars drown out pretty much every other noise, such as the crowds that cheer as you pass the stands. The only exception is for the pit crew guys, who keep you updated on your progress in the race and give you encouragement to keep on going. The soundtrack in the game is standard southern rock/country songs that isn’t nearly long enough, so you hear the same songs over and over enough that you’ll likely get sick of them soon enough.

While NASCAR 08 may be a fine game for the most part, it’s the repetitive workload required to get into the meat of The Chase mode that’ll drive people away quickly, if not the loose steering controls that require adjustment to get a good grip on the in-race gameplay. It makes it confusing to really guess who the game’s geared towards, as it potentially puts off both the hardcore and casual NASCAR fans that just want to jump into the career mode and have fun. Everything else seems to be fun enough, but it just doesn’t have the legs that the game really should have if the core mechanics weren’t so frustrating. Definitely rent the game first and see if you can stomach the licenses and contract races, otherwise you’ll most likely want to stay away and hope NASCAR 09 takes a different approach to make the fun parts of the game easily accessible next year.

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