
<MAP NAME="boxmap-p8"><AREA SHAPE="RECT" COORDS="14, 200, 103, 207" HREF="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm/privacy-policy.html?o=1" ><AREA COORDS="0,0,10000,10000" HREF="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/redirect-home/thearmchairem-20" ></MAP><img src="http://rcm-images.amazon.com/images/G/01/rcm/120x240.gif" width="120" height="240" border="0" usemap="#boxmap-p8" alt="Shop at Amazon.com">	Platform Playstation 2 Genre Racing Publisher Codemasters Developer Brain in a Jar ESRB E (Everyone) Released Q2 2003

- Good sense of speed - Plenty of car customization - Variety of race modes

- Too intimidating for rookies, too simplistic for veterans - Poor music - Environments lack detail

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Indycar Series

Score: 7/10

The Indy Racing League has been picking up steam over the last few years and now Codemasters has decided to make a game for it. Fans of this style of racing will likely enjoy the game, as it does a good job of giving that sense of urgency while keeping pace with the pack on an oval track, and has plenty of car tweaking to keep players happy. Fans of F1 and the CART series may be hugely turned off by this game because it is all left-hand turns in the game and can prove quite repetitive. But whatever side of the Indy car tracks you’re from there’s no denying that Indycar Series (IS) is a mixed back. It excels at physics and giving a sense of speed, but the lack of depth in the play modes and the general ease of the game will hamper the experience.

The first thing to realize when approaching this game is that it follows the Indy Racing League, not the CART series that most people associate with Indy Cars. A lot of people, if they were to see this game on store shelves may think to themselves, “Cool! An Indy Car game,” expecting it to be nothing but hairpins, chicanes, and sweeping turns as the negotiate the likes of Long Beach and Leguna Seca, but that ISN’T the case here. It’s all about the left-hand turn here and dealing with a large pack of cars at any given time. It’s a very different style of race from what most people associate with these cars, and needs to be clarified in regards to this game.

But there is a certain intensity to the experience, as players will find cars more readily on their tail as they try and continually shave off fractions of a second on the more gentle turns of the tracks found here. It’s a lot harder to escape the pack, so players have to constantly keep a wary eye on whose around them, ready to slip by at a moment’s notice. It’s exciting to have that kind of pressure just eating away while worrying about not making a silly, seemingly minute mistake on the turns, a real departure from concentrating primarily on complex series of turns with the competition almost an afterthought.

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The problem comes in that the competition in this game still doesn’t hold up too well. It won’t take long for players to start holding their own in the game, and people very familiar with this style of racing will likely find the game getting too easy too fast, because the competition just won’t hold up in the long run. Conversely this really makes IndyCars a very accessible title for rookies to this style of racing.

Unfortunately the overall setup and layout of the game is geared towards

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ardent racing vets with a taste for something different, and these gamers will likely find the level of overall challenge in the game underwhelming.

But despite the lack of strong competition, there’s plenty of nuts and bolts to IndyCar to make up for it. Firstly there’s a good mix of game modes for players to sink their teeth into, from training to various length races (from tiny ones for a little pick up and play to and full length 200 lap affairs). There’s also plenty of tweaking that can be done to the mechanics of the car, ranging from adjusting the wings to tire caster, to just about any other tweak you can think of to tailor car performance to the conditions of a race.

IndyCar also does a decent job with getting the aesthetics down. From a detail standpoint the cars look nice, very sharp, though the tracks themselves don’t exactly dazzle, especially the grandstands where the crowd is. But easily the strongest aspect of the visuals is the sold frame rate coupled with an excellent sense of speed. It really feels like you’re soaring around the track. The audio is well done too in terms of sound effects, with the engine noises and communication with the pit crew sounding appropriate. The music though is just annoying when present, hardly lending itself to the experience, and if anything taking away from the excitement.

What ultimately makes IndyCar Series good instead of great is it’s inability to really target an audience. It will be a little too easy for aficionados of this style of racing, and a little to daunting for rookies at the end of the day. But if you’re a big fan of the Indy Racing League, this game will likely still be enjoyable, considering the lack of gaming alternatives.

Mr. Nash

July 13, 2003