360

Played a couple of hours last night while my wife was off playing with iTunes upstairs. I started off in Drownington Cove, doing various things. I finished off the career races there (on two stars), then did some challenges, collected some liveries, got a couple of Mavericks, etc. Best race was probably a Raid challenge there. It starts off easily enough – you can stay ahead of the AI easily enough on the way to the first checkpoint by ignoring the roads – but the second half of the race is a bit harder, as you have avoid an awful lot of water. There’s a big body of water you have to dogleg past, then the final part of the race sees you picking your way between small pools. I eventually did it, after about four tries, by watching where the AI went, which revealed a path across the shallows at the side of the lake. Then it was just a case of sticking to the roads to avoid the pools, before powering across the grass to the finish line. Excellent stuff.

After that I moved on over to Redrock Bluffs, where I did some more career races. On the way to one of them I had another great Fuel moment. I was driving across the desert at night, when a sudden flash of lightning illuminated all the terrain and great forks of lightning appeared in the sky. It gave me a vivd honeymoon flashback, reminding me of watching storms roll in across the Grand Canyon as night fell. Perfect.

Then, this morning, I played for an hour or so before work, polishing off another two or three career races and unlocking three more areas of the map in the process. Wonderful stuff. I know I keep saying that, but it is.

This evening was set aside for an adventure – driving from Tsunami Reef in the top north-west corner of the map down to Redrock Bluffs (i.e. the Grand Canyon) in the bottom south-east corner. There’s a secret Achievement for doing it, but the best reason to do it is just because you can. I didn’t turn on my GPS for the journey and instead pointed myself south-east and drove, mostly on the Dirtgrinder bike, but I also used the Spider Wraith buggy for a while.

You start off on sand dunes, then you reach the grass, then the forest. Gentle rolling terrain becomes mountains, where I couldn’t quite go in a straight line and drive through narrow valleys, which luckily pointed in roughly the right direction. Then more hills and forests, until they give way to red desert. Driving the last few miles reminded me strongly of the drive through southern Utah and northern Arizona on my honeymoon – which was also a drive to the Grand Canyon. My wife was sitting next to me on the sofa, as she had done in the car on that drive and we talked about the music that had playing on the radio. (Shakira and the Stone Roses, if you’re interested.)

Shortly after that I reached the base camp in Redrock Bluffs, after a drive of one hour and forty minutes and ninety miles.

I didn’t celebrate for long, instead jumping into the Career race that takes you round the Skywalk, which is really quite scary. Of course, once I’d won that race, I drove straight off it and fell to my expected doom. Fun!

That was almost it, but I grabbed a nearby livery and vista point, then raced against a helicopter, which was great fun. And then I noticed my mileage was on 1,491, so I drove another nine miles and marked hitting the 1,500 mile mark by driving into a fence.

Fantastic stuff all round.

Had two half-hour sessions last night and an hour this morning.

The first session last night was simply free roaming around. Had a wonderful time finding my way up and around mountains to reach some liveries and vista spots. Great stuff, including a heart-in-mouth drive across a very narrow ridge.

The second session saw me find a challenge that I couldn’t do (of which more later). And then, for some reason I don’t understand, just before shutting down, I spent all my money. I went to the car list and chose random cars and bought them. I went down from over 100,000 Fuel to just over a thousand in seconds. Why did I do that? I’m not sure, honestly, but I think it was because I’ve been finding the currency a bit pointless, having so much stored up. I think I just wanted to get back to the beginning of the game, where every barrel found sitting in a forest or by a farm house was worth finding. I think I’m going to regret it, but we’ll see.

This morning I went to find the challenge I couldn’t do last night. It wasn’t the challenge marker I thought it was, so I went and did a nearby career race instead. I won on two-star difficulty on my first go without any problems. Then, though, the challenge was bothering me. Instead of driving to it, I just chose it from the menu. That’s the first time I’ve done that, but probably won’t be the last. You see, I have nothing against using the menus to go to races and challenges, it’s just not normally how I want to play, but this morning I just wanted to try the challenge again – so I did.

And what a challenge!

It’s a checkpoint race against nine other cars. You’re forced to use a particular car – one that goes incredibly fast in a straight line on asphalt, but which hates corners and which slows down to nothing the moment it hits dirt or grass. So, the tactics for the race are very simple – go fast on the straights and STAY ON THE ROAD. Yes, that deserves the capital letters. Coming off the road in this race is fatal. And it’s not easy to stay on the asphalt. You’ve got a car that doesn’t like corners. You’ve got nine other racers, all driving heavier cars that send you flying off the road the moment you touch them. Oh, and this all takes place in the middle of a huge storm, which reduces visibility quite significantly.

So, yeah, it’s hard. Luckily, the course you drive on, either by luck or genius design, is perfectly set up. It starts with two long straights, with a 90-degree corner in the middle. This does two things. It tells you as soon as you start the race for the first time everything you need to know – stay on the road, respect corners, go fast on straights. It also gives you, if you manage to stay on the road, a chance to get past most or all of the cars in your way. The next third of the race is the tricky part. If you’ve got out in front by the time you reach it – which you really need to do – it’s terrifying, full of sharp turns, climbs and drops. Taking it slow enough to stay on course, but not so slow that you fall behind, requires complete concentration. It’s very stressful, in the best way possible. Then comes the final third of the race, which is flatter, faster and actually quite easy. You can’t relax, as such, but it’s certainly less stressful.

It’s one of the best races I’ve ever done in a game. That track, combined with the opponents and the car you’re made to drive makes for a thrilling, difficult, rewarding race. When I finally won it – on my last try, no really, this one’s the last one before work – an Achievement popped up (for winning thirty challenges). I really felt like I’d earned it.

So there you are, one of the best races ever, either by luck or design. The interesting thing is, though, that if taken out of context – as a demo, say – the race would completely put people off the game. It works because you’re not always stuck using cars that can’t go off-road and refuse to go round corners, but because this is a special event. I’m never going to free roam in that car. For all I know, that’s the only challenge that will use it. But it’s brilliant.