Drome Racers
Score: 60% ESRB: Everyone Publisher: EA Games Developer: ATD Media: CD/1 Players: 1 - 2 Genre: Racing
Graphics & Sound: My first time at E3, I was surprised to find a bunch of developers showcasing work far away from the hustle and bustle of the big boys. In fact, these guys were sequestered away in what amounted to the dungeon of the show. Later, I learned from one developer that they came to the show with a strong demo of their game and hoped to get it picked up by a major publisher or even a large developer and used with a license. This, not surprisingly, is why most license games suck. But, with Drome Racers, we have possibly the first occurrence of an elevated form of code pimping. ATD, the developers of Rollcage, LEGO Racers and recent official Olympic sports games, are behind Drome Racers. Racing the first few tracks, I was having serious deja vu for Rollcage, in particular. It feels like LEGO came to ATD with a copy of Rollcage and said, 'Why don't we do something like this with LEGO cars?' Where LEGO Racers was a whimsical (but fun) game aimed at the young crowd, Drome Racers is most definitely trying to be a mature racer. The gamble seems to be that LEGO fans will gravitate toward their brand instead of being lured away to more original or well developed racing games. There's nothing wrong visually in Drome Racers. Lighting effects make even the most controlled lap feel like a rolling disco party, and this goes double for weapons. The settings you'll race in are varied, with nice wide streets on both city and outdoor terrain. And, at certain points in the game, you can enter drag-strip competitions that put you in a default driver's seat perspective, trying to qualify for the second stage of the challenge. Players not looking for extra challenge can skip these races altogether, but the variety is nice as well as the additional hurdle more seasoned racers will be looking for. And of course, since this is a LEGO game, you'll have all the time and tools needed to customize your racer or just build a new one from scratch. The music is unremarkable, but you can at least tell time was put in to provide some rockin' tunes.
Gameplay: The future will not be a safe place to cross the street... With nothing better to do, and lack of easy access to LEGO sets, people spend their time building crazy revved-up racers and putting them to work in the streets and tracks of The Drome. This huge racing city can make or break a racer, and you'll find out firsthand when you step into the shoes of Max Axel and try to hang with the big dogs. Career Mode is the city tour, and you'll have the chance the play multiple championship races, build your rep and your car and ultimately be known as the baddest of the bad on wheels. Within Career Mode you'll find more than a few ways to customize your vehicle and build the perfect racer. Unfortunately, the build mode is not as full-featured as we saw in LEGO Racers 2, where you could literally build a car brick by brick. Here, as in more mainstream racing games, the idea is to either pick a standard car with preset abilities and improve it or start from a bare frame and decide exactly what your car should be able to do. You don't just get free license to improve your car; you have to earn 'build tokens' during races that you can cash in to modify a car. It's too bad the hardcore build editor we see in other LEGO games couldn't have been incorporated into Drome Racers, because it dampens the spirit of play and creativity LEGO has always exemplified. But, at least during this mode you can feel as if you're not only building your rep on the race track, but also literally building a car in your garage. If Career seems a bit too involved or lengthy, and especially if you're just renting Drome Racers over the weekend, Arcade or Quick Race are enough to satisfy the merely curious.
Difficulty: Thanks to a strong track record for building Racing games, ATD comes through with balance and challenge. Damage has a realistic effect on how you perform, so the weapons (or poor driving) can seriously hurt you. About the only concession to gamers who might want to tweak difficulty is the ability to turn off 'auto catch-up.' I'm a firm believer in letting gamers pick what they want in a game like this, to the extent that we would be able to turn off weapons or damage if we chose to, but this option isn't available. As such, the racing/combat aspect of Drome Racers is set in stone. If that's what you want, that's what you'll get.
Game Mechanics: As mentioned, the engine is solid, thanks to ATD's previous entrees to the Racing genre for this and other platforms. I think the biggest thing that could be pointed to as lacking would be a more robust set of options and a better 'build' feature. In the presentation of Drome Racers, ATD and LEGO seem to be targeting gamers who might gravitate toward the brand but want something more mature. Not like LEGO-XXX or anything... :) Just more of a racer that looks and feels like the ones the big kids are playing. Control, graphics and the quick-and-dirty upgrade/mod system speaks to the experience ATD brings from its Rollcage days, and not that this is a bad thing, but I sure felt more like I was in LEGOLand with something like LEGO Racer 2 and its deep level and car editor. Why couldn't this have also been an option in Drome Racers? Without it, there's a flat quality and at least a critical lack of differentiation between this and any other futuristic racer out there. The coolest thing would have been a combination of Rollcage (itself a Wipeout clone...) and the great LEGO Racer 2. Without the benefit of interesting customization or extensive editors, Drome Racers comes off as a good futuristic racing game. But, with all the great racers in this category, I have a hard time recommending Drome Racers to anyone but a hardcore LEGO fan. If you're trying to recapture the fun of building and racing LEGO cars, Drome Racers just falls short. Not that you won't find solid racing action, but that's hardly a rare commodity these days...
-Fridtjof, GameVortex Communications AKA Matt Paddock
Driving Emotion Type-S Endgame