Asphalt Urban GT review

Asphalt Urban GT has ended up being the product of two considerable problems: firstly, it's essentially a port of an N-Gage game, and secondly, there are so many better examples of modern racing that it was always going to get unfairly compared to similar titles on the major consoles. Despite that, it did temporarily hold the achievement of best handheld racer on the market, but then it was the first to hit the DS, so it comes as little surprise.That's not the say the game isn't any good, because it is. Asphalt Urban GT offers a fluid frame rate, decent car models, competent arcade handling and a broad selection of vehicles. Whilst the 'Arcade mode' offers the usual range of time trial, quick race and brief challenges (plus an APB-in-3D style Cop Chase) it's the 'Evolution mode' that holds the longest attention span. Starting out with nothing in the garage (and the bank) you take part in a series of increasingly difficult championships spanning plenty of different classes and race types, all the time buying new cars and tuning up the ones you've already bought.Naturally, you start at the slower end of the vehicle list and work your way up, but even the initial Nissan 350Z can become a nippy monster with a few engine upgrades. Each championship is limited by aspects such as car class, manufacturer, age and good old horse power, so the races are usually close run and never unfairly easy or hard. There's no nasty rubber band catch-up, either, which is a huge relief. Tuning isn't as broad as it is in some games, but again, this is a handheld title and, as such, offers a good enough range to retain interest for short periods, and each modification really affects the handling of the car; there's even a drift-grip meter that adjusts as you add and remove parts and upgrades, so you can effectively tailor the way the car drives.Handling is distinctly arcade-like, and whilst grip mode isn't the most fun, adjusting your ride to drive in drift mode can bring some genuine thrills as you take 90 degree corners sideways, avoiding traffic and other racers. AI drivers can be problematic, often crashing for no reason into oncoming vehicles, but we suspect this is halfway due to the N-Gage port and keeping the difficulty level from peaking too early. Leaving the game on attract mode at the main menu cycles perpetually through various tracks and races, showing off the varied course selection but also highlighting the DS driver issues more noticeably.There's nothing particularly wrong with the way the game looks, once you've gotten over the fact that this isn't going to look like an Xbox game. The courses do look decent enough and everything moves at a great pace and never drops a frame, even when the screen is full of cars and the nice effects like smoke and sparks as metal touches metal. The car models are adequate, but hardly fantastic, and some of the drone traffic looks a little box-like, but when the shadows aren't falling through the road and on some of the better looking levels (the airport track looks great) the game looks sharp, solid and fluid - think decent first gen PS1 games like Rage Racer and you're somewhere near.The sound is a problem, though: the music is pretty awful across the board, and there's very little variation between engine sounds; not just from one tuning level to another, but also from one car to the next - most of them have the same engine samples which is a little odd and there's surely there's plenty of room on the cart from a bit of variety, but then this is a first generation DS game and needed to be on the shelves for the US launch. Presentation also shows a bit of a rushed job: there's next to no use of the touch screen (control is via the D-pad) and the menus scroll around just like most mobile phone games do. User defined controls aren't saved, either, so you'll need to reset them each time you power on.In light of newer releases, Asphalt Urban GT may seem obsolete, but despite its flaws, it really is a decent enough launch game - there's plenty of play time here and the multiplayer (one card per DS though) works well enough without offering anything we've not seen before.