By John Walker on July 7th, 2010 at 12:44 am.
Test Drive Unlimited was great, and not nearly enough people played it. For which you should feel just awful. There’s a sequel coming out on 21st September. Perhaps you’ve already signed up for the beta, checked out the details known so far, and I hope to goodness you’ve read Alec’s review of the original. What you should do today is watch the latest trailer showing off the islands’ environments.
There’s car driving in the second half, if you’re worried it all looks a bit too much like an architectural tour, but really it does capture the extraordinariment of the island. Try to ignore the accompanying tune, which sounds as though it should have been on The Best Of Chill Out Ever in 1998. The game’s being published by the ghost of Atari, and hopefully the beta should begin within the next month or so.
07/07/2010 at 00:47 Sweedums says:
loved the first one, and this looks great, i just hope the driving is better… much better.
07/07/2010 at 01:05 caesarbear says:
All the prettiness is going to be worthless if it doesn’t feel like your actually driving an expensive super car.
07/07/2010 at 11:54 caesarbear says:
come on people, no “yeah it crashes and burns every few hours” or “they promise the next model will be better” quips? I’m disappointed..
07/07/2010 at 01:06 Larington says:
I thoroughly enjoyed the first one so I have high hopes for this. There’s been several high profile racing games released recently, and every one my reaction has been “yes, but it’s not TDU 2 is it, that’s what I really want to play…”
07/07/2010 at 01:06 Drexer says:
What kind of music was that? I was halfway expecting Popcorn to start halfway through it.
They do seem to have quite a variety of colors, environments and with good contrasts in between them. Still need some more trailers to convince me though.
07/07/2010 at 18:34 iainl says:
It was incredibly cheesy trance. Which is perfectly appropriate, given the game is set in Ibiza.
07/07/2010 at 01:50 Jake says:
Looks really nice, but are the cars destructible at all? Driving is all well and good, but crashing is where it is at. Burnout knows.
07/07/2010 at 02:02 Deuteronomy says:
Music fit the atmosphere perfectly. Glad it wasn’t some indy-shit protest rock or thuggish gang speaking.
07/07/2010 at 02:53 Grape Flavor says:
Yeah what’s wrong with the music again? I can’t keep pace with what music is cool, what’s ironically cool, and what gets poked fun at anymore…
07/07/2010 at 03:21 The Walker says:
I’m still waiting for a racing game trailer that features this song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZtERdtMlJA
08/07/2010 at 06:49 Thants says:
They all do when I’m playing them.
07/07/2010 at 03:08 Skinlo says:
I liked that music!
07/07/2010 at 04:07 Rath says:
Decent looking vehicles, but the music made my shit itch.
07/07/2010 at 04:38 Bassism says:
It looks nice, and I want to be excited.
I couldn’t get over the physics in the first one though, so never logged more than a few hours in it. If they can support my G25 well and make me feel like I’m driving a car, I’ll be all over this.
07/07/2010 at 04:50 Dan says:
Why are the houses so detailed? Can you hop out and walk inside? A 1998-era 3D model just hopping out of the car and walking in the house making blip noises
07/07/2010 at 10:47 terry says:
If it’s anything like the first one, yes, you can.
07/07/2010 at 05:02 Moonracer says:
Any game with “Unlimited” in its title is unlikely to meet my expectations. Unfortunately I am not enough of a car buff to get my expectations very high. he video made me think of Just Cause 2′s world; only your only activity is driving better simulated cars. Though it did seem to hint at non driving activities.
07/07/2010 at 07:00 Jimmy Z says:
I really liked what the first one was trying to do and I did enjoy it somewhat. I’m a gamer all about atmospheres and emershun, so by default, a game mostly about driving around in gorgeous vistas in hot sports cars was just my cup of tea. Except the driving was shit. I’m highly allergic to shitty arcade controls where cars seem to have no mass and inertia and TDU certainly was all about shitty arcade controls (even if they weren’t as shittily arcade as in some other titles).
Luckily, they introduced the “Hardcore mode” a bit later on, which was something of an improvement but still the cars acted really wonky at times and every little bump on the road (and oh boy were the roads bumpy, they seemed to be made out of legos!) was able to launch you airborne so high that you had to start worrying about accidentally hitting the moon.
Having said that, TDU2 does look gorgeous and promises to include some nice car porn in beautiful scenery, adding further atmosphere enhancing elements like weather effects and day/night cycle in the mix. However, I fear that they haven’t been able to do anything with the car handling or more likely, they didn’t even want to, as sadly it seems that there are just too many people out there how actually enjoy shitty arcade controls. Guess I’ll just have to hope that the HC mode is a bit better this time around.
WTB: TDUish environments with Forza/GTish – semi-realistic driving, plx.
07/07/2010 at 07:01 BrokenSymmetry says:
Greatly looking forward to this. The world needs more games where you can just walk or drive around without any confrontation, just to relax.
07/07/2010 at 07:41 empfeix says:
Here is the song. It is a great tune even if it has some basic elements. Awesome vocals.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLrR1XuObOU&playnext_from=QL
07/07/2010 at 08:15 Harlander says:
How well does this play with a mouse-and-keyboard? It really looks like the sort of game that needs a steering wheel controller…
07/07/2010 at 08:34 fallingmagpie says:
Shame the trailer doesn’t demonstrate any of the grappling hook / parachute gameplay.
07/07/2010 at 09:40 Schmung says:
What other people said really. I tried the first one, but the weird handling put me right off. If memory serves it felt a bit like they’d not bothered modelling suspension in any meaningful way, so the weight transfers of your car were always really abrupt and things felt a bit too snappy – even in fairly tame cars.
Maybe this one will be better in that respect.
07/07/2010 at 10:54 terry says:
I’m hoping that the soundtrack is a little more balearic than that trance-lite tosh on the trailer, given that the game’s set in Ibiza. If it’s going to be all nasty horns and snarerolls they can fuck off. I demand musical quality in my CAR DRIVING GAME
07/07/2010 at 11:31 Wulf says:
Indeed, or at least the ability to replace the in-game music with entries from one’s own music collection.
That way I could listen to the Bravais Lattices when driving over large plots of open land.
08/07/2010 at 06:45 Thants says:
Doesn’t every game have the ability to replace the music with your own?
07/07/2010 at 11:21 mrpier says:
I used to be all over the arcade racers (Need for Speed, Toca, etc.), but somehow the genre doesn’t interest me any more. It might be that I burned out on it after all the hours I poured into Need for speed or that the car handling and career mode in Porsche 2000/Unleashed spoiled me too much.
07/07/2010 at 11:28 Chris says:
Where TDU failed, was the multiplayer aspect. It was just too awkward.
07/07/2010 at 14:43 Gdog says:
I dont like that song by El P or the rest of the album particularly. However, Company Flow – Funcrusher Plus is one of my favourite (of which El P is part of as you probably know). Really disappointed when I bought ‘I’ll Sleep When Your Dead’.
Company Flow – Krazy Kings
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PXB8uyJNZI
07/07/2010 at 14:44 Gdog says:
Reply Fail @ The Walker
08/07/2010 at 06:48 Thants says:
But I’ll Sleep When Your Dead is great!
08/07/2010 at 09:58 Matt says:
Opinions, man.
07/07/2010 at 16:05 Jackalope says:
Had the first one on my hard drive up until earlier this month when I inall completed it. Had it since release. It did feel unfinished but once you got the hang of the admitedly awful handling it was an amzing game. did feel unfinished, looks like the sequel is going to really fufil the potential the original had. The first let you put your own usic onto the radio, I suspect this one will let you do that to.
07/07/2010 at 17:05 TheSquarePear says:
Needs more hardcore
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_SG-YXp_N0Q
and the graphics are disappointing but I guess that didn’t hold the first one back.
Oh the memories of cruising Hawaii’s freeways in a Sagaris
It’s probably one of the few PC games to get close to GT’s amount of cars to choose from.
Hope they can get all of the licenses and keep the amount of DLC to a minimum (never got the megapack)
07/07/2010 at 19:03 John says:
I’m all for more electronic music in games, i am, but the trailer’ music carries a hint of euro pop, and… euro pop, not so interested :/ . Perhaps it’s relevant to Ibiza, but i wish they’d gone with more experimental music, or at least electro pop, or electro house.
In any way, game looks awesome, but i never gave the first a chance. Is it arcade or sim racing? If it’s arcade, count me in.
07/07/2010 at 19:17 Marcin says:
Instabuy for me. Loved the first game, although I never did go back to get that achievement for driving EVERY road, heh.
I also simply *love* that they’re just throwing in Hawaii as well. It’ll be awesome to check out how far tech has advanced since TDU1 (the day/night and environment effects, for one).
08/07/2010 at 06:37 pipman300 says:
someone make a toyota game where your car never stops