Publisher: Activision
Developer: Bizarre Creations
System requirements: Windows XP/Vista/Win 7, 3.4 GHz Pentium D Dual Core/AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ or better CPU, 256 MB DirectX 9.0c-compatible NVidia GeForce 6600GT or ATI Radeon 1600XT or better graphics card with Shader 3.0 support, 1 GB of RAM (2 GB for Vista/Win 7), 14 GB of hard-drive space, DirectX 9.0c-compatible sound card
Genre: Racing
Release date: Available now

Blur is, as the TV spot suggests, a powered-up racing experience. You get to travel the globe from Los Angeles and San Francisco to Spain to London, with tracks based on modified versions of familiar real-world environments, such as the Los Angeles River halfpipe. It’s racing with a twist, though: along the way, you pick up eight different types of power-ups, none of which is entirely defensive (most offensive power-ups can be used defensively as well; for example, a well-placed Mine or Bolt can shoot down an incoming Shunt, and one upgrade lets you use your shield as an offensive weapon).

Blur is, by far, one of the fastest-paced racing experiences that I’ve played in a while, with the added complication of having up to 19 other cars trying to put a Shunt up your tailpipe. In multiplayer mode, you can play against up to four players via splitscreen (only two on the PC version), or online against up to 19 other racers. You can’t play online with splitscreen at the same time. There’s also an extensive single-player career. In career mode, you have access to many licensed cars, ranging from Dodge Vipers to Lotus Exiges to Ford Transit vans fitted with F1 engines, all of which have full damage modeling and traits such as acceleration, speed, drift, grip and stability. You can earn up to seven lights for each race: up to five for finishing first, or for gaining enough points in a destruction race, or for having more than 20 seconds left on the clock at the end of a time trial; one for completing a Fan Challenge; and one for beating the Fan Target for the race. Earning enough lights unlocks the next part of the game’s story.

There are three types of races. In addition to what you would think of as a “standard” race and a “time trial”-type race, there’s also a destruction race in which you shoot drone vehicles with nothing but Bolt power-ups for points. Each of the major competitors has four requirements you must complete before you can compete in a one-on-one race with them. Win the race and you unlock their car and get eight lights and an upgrade. You can only equip one upgrade at a time, but you can change upgrades at the start of each race; one lets you fire four Bolts per power-up instead of three, for example. You gain Fan points for almost everything: a clean lap, a good drift, hitting someone with a rear-launched Shunt, hitting someone with a front-launched Mine, hitting someone with all three Bolts from a Bolt power-up, hitting multiple cars at the same time with a Barge power-up, and so on. Gaining enough Fan points unlocks new cars in career mode, and additional modes in multiplayer. In career mode, you can repeat any race any time you want, and even select a different vehicle each time (though it still has to be a vehicle in the class defined by the track, from Class D up to Class A).

One of the things I love about Blur is that losing a race is by no means the end of your career. Just start the race again, or even play a different race and come back later to the one you lost. I also love that even though your car can take damage and can even be destroyed, it won’t end the race; you simply respawn in the same place where you were destroyed. In a game this fast-paced, though, respawning can be the kiss of death, especially if you’re on the last race. In the time it takes you to re-accelerate from a dead stop, you could end up so far back in the pack that there’s no way for you to regain your lead. If you slide out of control and end up facing the wrong way, you don’t need to turn around. The game will automatically put you back on the track facing the right way, but again, you have to re-accelerate from zero. The cars themselves are by far the most beautiful part of the game. The scenery is a little less detailed, but I don’t see that as an issue, since I’m too busy trying to pick up power-ups and dodging incoming Bolts and Shunts.

I do have a few complaints about Blur, though. The most obvious one is that there are only a few race types, and each time you play one, the same power-ups appear in the same place every time. This can, and does, get repetitive after a while. The cars are beautiful, but there’s no customization beyond changing the paint color and choosing one upgrade that you’ve won in career mode; many of them sat unused when I played because I quickly picked favorites and stuck with them. You have no way of previewing a track before playing it, so the first time you play a particular race, you have no way of knowing whether a grippy car or a drifty car is best. And, finally, in the single-player career mode, you max out your Fan points long before you actually complete your career, so you reach a point where the only reason for continuing to try to get the maximum number of lights is to unlock achievements (called “stickers”).

So, ultimately, Need for Speed it most definitely is not. It is definitely fun, though. Sure, single-player career mode gets a bit repetitive after a while, but I still haven’t gotten tired of multiplayer. Blur is a worthwhile addition to the collection of anyone who likes fast-paced racing games but doesn’t expect the realism of serious games such as those in the Forza series.

Our Score:
Our Recommendation: