Test Drive Unlimited for PC - Hawaiian tour!

(This is less likely to be a full-fledge review; heck, it probably is just a rant. Therefore, I apologize for any horrid grammatical errors, light profanities and lack of proper paragraphing)...

To Start With

In this entry I've decided to be less 'formal' than usual, as this is about my own gaming experience with Test Drive Unlimited - Unfinished Business version. No, I make that up, 'cause it's literally true - I haven't yet finish playing the game no matter what. In fact, I think that I can never finish playing this game.

Reason? Well, first of all, it's about me, the player having to stroll around Hawaii, exploring every roads, completing all missions, then smoking some unfortunate tires, picking some babes around the vicinity, flashing my cars and some occasional motorbiking around the island. Secondly, the cars. Ohhh, the cars featured in the game are just lovely. Damn, if I just happen to have at least one of those Ferrari in real life, that would be really cool! Exactly that is what I feel when playing the game. I sit inside the car, using the cockpit view, listening to the revving engine sound, start moving through the traffic, some high-speed car chase with the cops, picking up some babes with sporty cars; it's a man's dream on the street (and no, I won't include sex as there isn't any in the game! Want some? Go find 'Hot Coffee' version of GTA San Andreas!)

Game Settings, Graphics : HDR, Motion Blur

Okay, goin' a bit technical, I'm playing this game with my usual settings on graphics: 1024x768 res, 4X AA, 8X AF, max world details and no HDR! Yes, I must highlight here that HDR in TDU doesn't look like HDR; it's more like 'bloom' effect as seen in NFS Most Wanted, you know, that bright white aura at every edge of objects in the scene, the effect in movies that indicates the scene in a dream. I don't favour it apart from the fact that my 7800 GT doesn't allow AA+HDR and the undeniable performance hits I will take when enabling it. So, no HDR in this game for me ( I might exaggerate this but just play the game, you'll see what I mean!)

The much touted motion blur in action

Other graphical beauties that exist in the game is the motion blur effect. All I can say is that it is implemented in a right manner: two-thumbs up man! It's nowhere like Fast & Furious NOS-triggered motion blur effect, but it is as if you're driving in actual life, slowly from a start and gradually picking speed and then you realize your view is a bit out of focus at the left and right (this might be hard to describe, but TDU is trying very hard to simulate this, and I understand it). The effect also seems dynamic; the magnitude of blurriness increases as you are speeding way beyond normal driving speed (I called this 'The Curse of the Exotics'! Go figure.)

Teasing a Maranello, with cops around!

The level of details in TDU is a bit above satisfactory, at least from my POV. The cars are modeled accurately although I have some problems with the rendering of the car sports rim (looks 2D, way behind compared to those in NFS Carbon), some attention to details are present in the car interior. The varieties of gears & attires; well they're quite fashionable I would say. The world details is almost believable: I mean I've never been to Hawaii, but I can tell that there are significant amount of effort that have been put into the game to make it what it is. The road, the surroundings, the town...I mean, it is unfair for me to say that it is the true Hawaiian landscape but please, if there's someone out there who is keen enough to tell me at least, in percentages, how close the game with the real Hawaii is!

I flunked my Ferrari just to show you the reflection on the water

Not so realistic, a bit poor implementation

Hey, it looks better from a far

Nicely rendered sea water with that boat reflection on it, followed by an unnecessary sea drowning later on

Capturing Eye Candies

Accompanying these eye candies is the way to capture them: an in-game photo snapper. It is intuitive, responsive and it functions way better than the limited ones in NFS Carbon (for comparison). I can pan, zoom, rotate with bigger angles and distances, it gives me more powerful tool to put an exotic touch when photographing an exotic car. It just works for me.

This is the one!

TDU is a game played during daytime only, something that feels awkward when paired with an almost realistic environment. Sorry, no night time driving folks! On the other hand, this decision might be done in order to make full use of the photo snapper (purely my guess though, as night time snapshots are not so effective!) In this game, apart from clear daytime with blazing sunlight, there are some occurrences of cloudy skies as the player moves around in the island. That is as far as the weather realism goes in the game. I've captured some shots showing the difference in weather and you can judge it for yourself.

Sunny day!

It's getting cloudy, dude!

Better be home soon!

Nice filtering of the sun rays by darker clouds

Gaming Performance

Under previous AMD 64 3000+, 1 GB DDR, NF4 platform, I scored around 35 fps average in this game. Yeah, pretty sucked that I had to turn down AA and AF level in the game. Now, under Core 2 Duo E4300 and 2 GB DDR2 in i945P platform, I manage to get around 47 fps with stock CPU speed. OCing my E4300 to 2.4 GHz gives me 50+ fps stable with souped up AA and AF level. That make sense as at 1024x768 res, I am still pretty much bottlenecked by CPU. At this point, 7800GT is here to stay...well, it might stay until all those fiasco regarding early DX10 game settle down( Damn you EnvyDia, where is G9x??)

Some Bugs Perhaps

Back to the game. At any point, I have to highlight one very important thing: this game is horribly buggy! Maybe as the result of being ported from console game, TDU developer didn't make it a smooth transition to PC version of the game. I can't list all the bugs here, Google around as there are many discussion about this game. Among the bugs are the savefile can be easily corrupted, graphics anomaly after changing resolutions, another graphics anomaly when returning to game after toggling HDR option. It's a common gesture among gamers who praised TDU for being a great game, only to be hampered with such horrendous bugs and instabilities. Having said so, however I haven't got time to search around for patches from the Atari.. let me see hmm...Oh, there's probably one here that's being discussed.

Anyway, despite the game issues, I can play it with some peace in my mind that the game delivers what I've dreamed about driving exotic cars! Really, this game brings back memories of Need For Speed in its early series, except this is better. I can adjust my seat position, enjoying almost realistic interior view, responsive speedometers and rear mirror, etc etc. If I had a Logitech G25 FF Steering Wheel, the whole experience would be pimped up way a few notch!

The Simple Story Unfolds

The game starts with a scene at the airport which shows me, the character I will play, are waiting at the departure hall. The game require me to select from a few characters; a babe, some Linkin Park-style guy, another simpler looking guy, probably another babe with different slutty appearance(can't remember exactly!)...I mean there are a few of them. I select one that represent a close resemblance of myself and off I go to Hawaii.

Upon arrival, I have to rent a car to get myself a house to stay while I roll in the island. I buy a house at the real estate agency and that's where I started the journey to discover the whole Aloha. My home is where i do my stuff: parking my cars, changing my appearance (not including some extreme makeover!), reading news, checking my achievements, watching LCD TV, buy and sell cars etc etc. It's my port to let myself go (in a good manner though!).

Cars & Homes : Big Boys Toys

I can buy as many houses or mansions that I want provided that I have enough money and I have discovered vast areas in the island, revealing more real estate agencies and homes available for purchase. Another reason to buy is when your existing garage are already full with cars. For example, my first house can accommodate 4 vehicles max. Having bought the fifth cars requires me to get another house. Another thing, the location of the house can help you spread your appearance around the island, especially if you're on the quest of discovering every hidden events, houses, missions and some random guys and babes to pick up (again, not for sex as they're hitchhikers, damn!). So, I have to strategically select the location as I game along.

Pete Sampras might live here!

The price of the house varies from $100K++ to even some millions of dollars (I'm talking about those which can store up to 10 vehicles!), and the design, well yes..there are varieties of them. Each house is unique and has some touches of what real people dreams about their ultimate home design (of course, to some extent only). Whenever you're surveying a specific house, either through the agency or by visiting it yourself, the game allows you to have a virtual tour around the house. That's what I do and I can say that I'm impressed with the level of details that Atari takes in designing them.

A house to live in

How The Game Goes

Once again, back to the core of the game. Basically, I have to endure and experience these in order to progress in the game: do repetitious street racings (with up to 7 opponents), time limit racing, speed limit racing, send babes to their destination in specified time frame, pick random hitchhikers and deliver them within time limits, some mysterious 'possible-crack-delivery' missions, car delivery missions (I like this one) ..and some other that I might miss to mention.

The rest is probably strolling all the streets available. Oh yeah, I have to mention that the more distance I cover, I get some sort of level increment. For example, when I exceed 40 kilometers (or miles), the game award me with Tourist status (again, I can't remember this correctly, but it does reward me with a status).

Yo, yo, Right here man!

Dude, can you ride me home?

I smoke this bitch so hard I can't even see anything!

Braaaace yourself!!

Listen, can you deliver this baby to the airport for $90K?

Car delivery mission

This junk is about to ask me to deliver some 'goodies' for him


See..I told ya!

Future 500CC Moto GP champ

Speaking of rewards, there are a few more that you can achieve. You get some awards or rewards as you exceed some points during delivery missions (babes, hitchhikers and items), successful car delivery, number of cars purchased in the form of cash, tags to buy some new clothes, some unlockings here and there (new houses, boutiques, car dealers, cars, tuner shops etc). Lemme give a hint: explore every nook and cranny in this island, and you'll understand how the game expands and progresses.

A perfect delivery

Another perfect delivery

The gesture of a victorious speedfreak

Cars...OMG, I forget to tell you about cars. Okay, this ain't Fast and Furious inspired game, therefore, there's not much of import tuners around, but they are there. European cars are a must and I see a lot of American muscles in the game. Exotics? No question about it: Ferrari Enzo, Saleen S7, McLaren F1, those from Mercedes, exotic muscles from Viper...I mean, the list goes on and on. It is also a perfect balance between modern cars and classic cars: yes, there are classic cars from 60's in the game.

"Holy explicit rant, Batman! But did you forget about the tuner shop?". Yes, TDU allows some tuning and performance upgrade to the car, but it is fairly limited. Visit some tuner shop and you're presented with 3 Levels of upgrade only. Be careful not to overtune your car as sometimes it is best to keep the balance between power and control at the right pace. Trust me, Level 3 upgrade Pagani Zonda doesn't look good in terms of handling though.

Inside a tuner shop for Aston Martin

Purchase your upgrade Level and see the upgrade in specs

All cars are categorized into Group A to G and it is advisable to have at least a car from each group. This is important as some races and missions do specify the group of car that it allows. I even stumble upon some races and only require cars from a specific manufacturer only. In some mission, some babes only accept me with 2-door sedan, some want me in Saleen only (bitch!)..and this rant also goes to those male hitchhikers! Fortunately, I am served with a very informative in-game map and menu that allow me to see all requirements prior to selecting a mission or race. The navigational Hawaiian map is the key to complete the game and kudos to the developer, the map is way better than that in NFS Underground 2.

The map is also rendered in 3D with visible moving cars, even a plane

We got an in-game radio tuner too

.....and some babes I picked up in Hawaii

"Wassup, sweet thang! Goin' somewhere??"

An athletic babe, probably Sporty Spice of Spice Girls

"Thanks for not unbuttoning the..I mean, thank you!"

"Emm, that's a nice hot rod you got there!"

"I can lift you to anywhere, babe. Hop in!"

One sultry looking babe really turns my antenna on!

"Give me a fuck*n ride, you f*cktw*t! Can't you see I'm f*ckin sweat'n here?"

I definitely have to stop here, because suddenly I don't know what else to say about the game (and I'm obviously off the hook!). I know I have a lot of segments in the game that I should cover but, let's make it an exercise for you to find more information from some other reviews. The fact remains that I haven't even complete the game, but from the current progress, things will tend to stay repetitive till the end. I might post something about TDU later on, especially if I have more screenshots to share with you.

I don't like the feel of riding this bike in the game

Gotcha, Zonda! I betcha bleeding gas right now!

Extra information:

Test Drive Unlimited: Gamespot review
DriverHeaven review
TweakTown review