Rallisport Challenge 2

[nonny]

Agree with Soi here.

Live play sounds a bit silly racing against wireframe opponents but given the whole object of rallying it works and the stages are too narrow meaning on most levels 16 players with collisions on would be horrendous.

That said 4 player as standard is great fun online.

Myself I am still not warming to the handling, it seems very direct at times and very arcadey with not much sliding control. Perhaps I just suck mind as I have only had this game for one evening so far.

On the plus side, yes the graphics are quite stunning but funnily the ice stages dont look as polished as they did in the first game. If anyone remembers the shine off the ice in the original was stunning and very realistic. Its not terrible in this of course, it just doest seem to look as good for some reason.

Other than that the graphics are some of the best seen in a racer on the Xbox yet IMO... and I cannot wait to get it running in prog scan as I just bought a DLP projector last week, just waiting on the required cables to arrive.

[PeteJ]

A lot better than the first game so far, the structure of the single player game has thankfully been improved.

Handling still isn't as enjoyable as Colin4, but the graphics are among the best on the Xbox. I'm not all that far into the game at the moment, but the track design hasn't been that great so far, nothing like Colin anyway.

Some annoying game design, such as losing the pace notes for the Hill Climb which makes it all but impossible to get around. You get an option in the rally stages for either a map or pace notes (and obviously you choose the notes...), but when you reach the hill climb you seem to get given nothing - unless you go into the options and select the map (which then gives you the map for the Rally stages). Poor design.

Better than the first game though.

[Soi]

I agree about the pace notes/map thing. The Hill Climb sections are unplayable without the map, but pace notes would have been better. It felt like cheating to put the map on, as it is listed as a 'driving aid', but it is essential and I'll keep it on for all modes.

[ThoseOfTheUnlight]

Looking forward to this, going to go and pick it up now, anyone up for a game this afternoon sometime?

[007]

Don't you need to play the 1 player pretty heavily to get all the cars and what not for the Online play?

Anyway, my copy should be here in a few days.

[Soi]

Yeah, but I don't think it will take too long.

Will be a bit of a pain, but such is life.

[rcb]

Is this game region free? ( Meaning the NTSC copy will work on a PAL machine? Only i'm going to America in the next few days and want to play it on Xbox Live so might get it from there.

[John Beaulieu]

i think it is

[rcb]

Good to hear, thanks :P

[PeteJ]

I just completed the very first skill level with maximum points (420 or whatever) and I'm enjoying this...sort of. The handling is far better than before, although as I said above, it isn't as impressive as Colin 04's, also the graphics are really quite special - yet the game feels quite lifeless, just like the first did.

The difficulty on the first championship is incredibly weak (winning by over a minute each race without trying or knowing the tracks) and so this may have a lot to do with the lack of 'feeling' in the game, but it isn't a good sign so far.

I don't think it helps how much the game jumps about during each rally, you can have the first stage in the UK and then suddenly jump to America and then off to Sweden at the end. It doesn't really make sense for a rally title.

I shall continue with the game however as it is quite playable, and also the unlockable stuff is quite well implimented as it rewards progression and time spent playing.

[rcb]

Hmm, i'm not too fussed on the one player as 16 people online will make it for me...well, should do.

[Soi]

16 people online is very good. Just been playing a few races of that. The only thing that annoys meis that you can only talk to the person in front or behind. In a 16 player Rally Cross race the positions change so often that talking to anyone is hard. Also the same rule applies when there are only 4 people, which is silly. They should have kept voice completely open for 4 people.

The first difficulty setting is very easy. I decided to jump straight to Champion, which is quite a lot harder -I'm happy if I get over 10 points per race at the moment.

[VR46]

I've started with Champion also, one mistake though and you've lost the race, nice idea though to get the bonus car for just completing races rather than having to win.

[fifty?ballz]

I'm really looking forward to this game, the first one pushed the XBOX
to the limits graphically, like Sonic The Hedgehog did things no other games
came close to on the Megadrive. Ralli Sport Challenge 1 made a monkeys
of all other racing games like Collins and all the halfwit **** graphics games
that keep appearing around it.

[fifty?ballz]

Played both versions 1 & 2 games when I visited Kingston LJ today.

Oh dear. Graphically it's not as good as Ralli Sport 1 (no bump mapping,
lower detail cars, lower quality decals) what a pitty. Maybe a better game
playwise, but I'll never get to know, I'm not getting younger and playing
**** graphic games isn't what I'm about.