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NASCAR 08

Score: 8.5 / 10

From its humble origins as a bunch of moonshining hillbillies racing from the law throughout the South, NASCAR sure has grown into a immensely popular entity, as races typically draw upwards of 100,000 fans packing in racetracks each weekend, cheering on their favorite drivers. Once again, the newest NASCAR-themed game from Electronic Arts captures the true excitement of NASCAR for those that get excited about cars racing around a track one left turn after another.

In this year’s NASCAR title, there’s not much new to get revved up about. However, that’s because what’s been fine-tuned in the past few versions of EA’s NASCAR have left an already first-rate NASCAR racing game. Although beware that you’ll be challenged immensely trying to handle the real-life physics of the cars, and learning how to modify your ride (with 40 tuning controls) to drive smoothly while in the heat of vehicular battle on the game’s 22 NASCAR tracks.

It’s those realistic physics that can be frustrating, especially in the new The Chase career mode challenges. If you’re not flawless in your driving, expect to spend 

 

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plenty of retry attempts just to pass to the next challenge. The Chase setup as the career mode is very good, however, with plenty of racing events and mini-games that will test your pedal to the medal and maneuvering abilities.

Nothing that could be considered innovative comes along for the ride in NASCAR 08, although

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there’s a cleaner “navigation” system via the Vehicle Telemetry Visor that gives you the real-time status of your car’s handling and your position currently on the track.

There’s more than NASCAR to race, too. NASCAR 08 contains the Busch Series and Craftsman Truck Series along with the Nextel Cup Series. All of NASCAR’s drivers are in the game, as well as their actual cars, and even the new, somewhat controversial Car of Tomorrow (which doesn’t seem to be much different than the car of today) that is raced in select events on the Nextel Cup circuit is here.

There is online racing, but the setup isn’t very conducive to fun, easy-to-connect NASCAR competition against up to 16 other Xbox Liver gamers. It can be really annoying just getting into an actual online race, as you must wait until the host begins the race. In the meantime, you’re left to practicing on the online track.

And in my case many times, practicing yet more. I didn’t have much luck joining an online game that began nearly as quickly as I logged in. When racing did begin, it unfortunately many times was mostly a choppy, stuttering and sputtering affair. Online, NASCAR 08 blows a gasket compared to its good single-player campaign.

But while NASCAR is leaking oil online, at least everything looks good, as the next-generation boost under the gaming engine hood is evident the moment the rubber hits the asphalt. For the NASCAR fans looking for the chance to pursue The Chase on their Xbox 360, stock car racing doesn’t get any better than NASCAR 08.

- Lee Cieniawa

lcieniawa@armchairempire.com

(September 4, 2007)

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