Asphalt 3D (Nintendo 3DS) Review

When Cubed3 first got its hands on Asphalt 3D, the feeling was that although Gameloft had obviously ported this across from the latest iteration of the series to grace Apple’s App Store, it worked pretty well for a launch day 3DS game for anyone eager to satisfy their need for something in the racing genre. What happened after that was the sublime Ridge Racer 3D turned up, and although criticised in some quarters for being a quick port using the engine from the two PlayStation Portable editions, it proved to be one of the best Day One releases. Going back to Asphalt 3D after that has been painful, to say the least. Now, before diving into a strong negative critique of the Ubisoft-published effort, it should be stated that this is nowhere near as bad as some would have you believe. Okay, it is terribly rough around the edges, lifts numerous ideas from the Burnout series, and does not particularly use the 3D effects of the Nintendo 3DS as much as it could do, yet there is a rather stable racing experience buried inside the diminutive 3DS cartridge.

The main issue to plague Asphalt 3D are technical problems, primarily in terms of the long loading times encountered and slowdown during races. Loading comes into play right after the game’s introductory video sequence (that has not been tailored for 3D, by the way, unlike Namco Bandai’s Ridge Racer 3D that looks amazing with 3D turned all the way up), with a very obvious progress bar that once took eleven seconds to gradually fill up and move on to the title screen. Even changing from one car to another on the vehicle select screen can result in up to a five second wait before the car image pops up and the female voice-over kicks in to announce its name, plus moving from one menu option to another results in almost a second’s delay rather than being instantaneous as it should be. It all smacks of a game that has been shoe-horned onto the hardware without the care and attention that Namco Bandai’s development team put in for Ridge Racer 3D (a game that even had its frame-rate stabilised before launch following early negative feedback!).

Asphalt 3D is all about the solo player’s Career mode, where fourteen cups must be worked through, each one containing five races, varying in nature. The general set-up is as follows: two standard races where the aim is to finish in the top three; a time trial that focuses on fast driving, attempting to reach the finish line before the time runs out; ‘Leader of the Pack,’ a survival race where maintaining the lead for the duration of the race in the name of the game; a fifth bonus one-on-one duel that is unlocked once the other four challenges have been completed. There are other variations on the theme, like ‘Chase’ and ‘Drift,’ for those hoping for more variety.

As players work through the Career mode, they reach different levels that then open up new cars, as well as the eight in-game sponsors whose logos appear on the vehicle of choice, each of which adding special bonuses, such as tighter handling, increased acceleration, a higher top speed, considerably more boost, and more money (the latter two are augmented during races anyway, as each track is littered with a massive supply of cash and boost icons). The actual racing itself can be fun at times, since the handling and drift mechanic is solid, if not spectacular, yet the juddering nature of the action makes races painful for the most part.

Everything is fine and smooth when racing on your own, if you manage to overlook the poor draw distance that results in trees popping up out of the blue or, even worse, when other general traffic appears at the last second to cause massive crashes. Boosting, gained by drifting around corners or having Burnout-esque near misses with other cars, can also bring about a headache as when hitting ramps, the vehicle will slowly become airborne, floating through blocky trees with heavily pixellated leaves before smashing down on the tarmac again, normally bringing about attention from police who then proceed to keep pace no matter how much boost is used, attempting to drive you off the road. Basically, drifting around a race course in Time Trial mode alone, with no other movements on-track would be fine, but considering that is not what Asphalt 3D[/i] is all about it suffers terribly to the point where players will have to have considerable patience and high levels of tolerance to work through all the trials.

Those with the patience of a saint should know that Asphalt 3D’s attempt at keeping the player motivated to return time and time again is to open up every one of the sixteen Achievements, which range from ‘Discover 1 shortcut,’ ‘Eliminate 5 opponent vehicles,’ and ‘Win 1 event in Career Mode,’ to more convoluted goals such as ‘Crash into 50 traffic cars,’ ‘Pick up 100 power-ups,’ and ‘Spend $1,000,000 on vehicles.’ Then there is the pleasing inclusion of a StreetPass mode whereby any ‘Extra Data’ that gets stored on the 3DS system’s SD card will be used to interact with other 3DS owners that have played Asphalt 3D, checking out best lap times and various statistics to determine the winner in the StreetPass Racing Battle. The incentive for continued play in this case is extra money or new decals for vehicles. The progression of rewards granted is for individual integer meetings between one and ten, then jumping in tens until the number of encounters reaches 50, and goes as far as 2,500 and 5,000 Players Met, with these last two rewards merely being ‘Are You Serious?!’ and ‘WOW!!!’ - so if anyone reaches those totals, please be sure to inform us of the prize! As well as all this, up to six players can partake in multiplayer racing shenanigans, although each person will require a copy of Asphalt 3D to join in.