007 Racing

• Release Date: November 22, 2000
• Genre: Racing
• Style: Mission-Based Racing
• Similar Games: The Dukes of Hazzard: Racing for Home (PlayStation), Driver 2 (PlayStation), The Italian Job (PlayStation)

Game Description

In 007 Racing, you'll take to the streets as the world's most famous spy. Over the course of the game, you will get to drive Bond's various vehicles, such as the Aston Martin DB5, BMW 750, BMW Z8, Lotus Esprit, and BMW Z3. But these aren't just base models, as that would hardly suit a world class leader of espionage. These fast cars have been updated with the high-tech gadgets and armor that one would expect from Q's secret underground shop. Along with powerful (and stylish) armor, the cars can be equipped with rockets, automatic guns, smoke screens and oil slicks.

Each of your missions are objective-based, giving you an area in which to drive and a list of different tasks to accomplish, including hunting down enemies, escaping areas with counter-agents hot on your tail, or locating different items before the bad guys do. You'll globe hop to accomplish your mission, heading to places such as Eastern Europe, Amsterdam, South America, Mexico, Monte Carlo, Louisiana and New York.

Review: Overall

It's probably safe to assume that most gamers have at one point or another dreamed of filling James Bond's shoes, especially when Bond jumps behind the wheel of a sports car filled with gadgets and guns. 007 Racing lets you do this, and it's a great concept for a videogame. Unfortunately, it fails to deliver the excitement one would expect from such an interesting license.

Even with a host of intriguing concepts, 007 Racing doesn't manage to entertain, especially considering its great theme. Jumping into a fast car and blowing things up should fundamentally be an engaging experience, and when people manage to get it wrong, questions must be asked and companies must be held accountable. Such is the case with this title, which has the ideas but lacks the control, design consistency, and smooth, attractive look that the concept demands.

While the cars all have noticeably different handling, they don't control quite as well as you would hope from their expensive and exclusive reputations. Rather, they're all fairly sluggish, with turning and acceleration that misses the mark. They don't feel attached to the road enough, and that really hurts the title, since they are the focus and attraction to the game in the first place.

The weapons aren't as fun to use as they should be, either. For starters, you can hold but one, meaning if you accidentally pick a weapon that you don't want by running over it, there's nothing that can be done to stop it. And aiming is impractically difficult, often making you wish that you had a crosshair to guide you as you fire away.

The missions given to you are certainly varied, but their problem is that the quality is inconsistent. Most of the missions are of the hunt-and-kill variety, and these are generally annoying only because of the game's suspect control. But others, where racing is the predominate theme, can range from thrilling to incomprehensible to just plain dull.

Even the great missions only serve to highlight how disappointing the game is, although they do at least manage to deliver some enjoyment for your hard-earned money. But they won't satisfy anyone enough to justify playing through the rest of the game.

007 Racing looks as if it came out the day after the console was released rather than during the year 2000. Nearly every visual aspect of the game is substandard, from the bulky models, made even more apparent by the smooth sheen that sports cars should feature, to the textures, map design, and so forth. Everything looks downright ugly, which is disappointing when you consider the number of beautiful games released on the platform. What went wrong?

In the end, despite a theme that seemed infallible, complete with Spy Hunter gameplay and some interesting objectives to complete, the control, look, and overall feel of 007 Racing fails to thrill, chill, shake, or stir your consciousness to warrant giving it a go.

Review: Enjoyment

While the concept was interesting, the execution leaves much to be desired. If only it was better designed, this could have been a great title, but all of its kinks serve to render it very weak.

Review: Graphics

The graphics of this game are horrible, considering how far along the PlayStation has come in the past five years. There's no excuse for the muddled mess that appears onscreen.

Review: Sound

The sound in this game, from the purr of the engines to the Bond soundtrack, is a little better than average, which for this game makes it outstanding.

Review: Replay Value

There are a lot of different objectives to complete, and they could keep you busy for a while if you could stand to play it that long.

Review: Documentation

The instruction manual is decidedly bland and average.

Production Credits

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