In-game advertisements are everywhere but are in no way overbearing.‚  In fact, they become a tool by which to remember where to brake or accelerate.‚  Oh it’s the “Canon” sign, time to break or I’m screwed.

Audio in RACE Pro is also spot on.‚  Recordings are taken directly from real life tracks and you can definitely hear it.‚  With my 5.1 surround sound system, the slightest acceleration, deceleration, revving of the engine or the crunch of a mistimed brake before a wall can all be heard with deafening stupor.‚  However, as races drag on and the novelty of the genuine noises wear off, you might elect to play some tunes off your HDD and speed around to your own beat.‚  Every audio setting can be tweaked in the options to fully reduce in-game noise to allow you to do so.

The damage system in RACE Pro is an exact replication of real life.‚  Hit a wall at more than a minimal speed and your car will suffer, if not right away, soon enough.‚  When your car has taken too much damage, an icon with a screwdriver will popup and that’s your warning to keep it clean the rest of the race or you won’t be finishing anywhere near where you want to.‚  Just for the sake of it, I ran my car into the ground and while I was not fully immobilized, the alignment was so off that the car would careen to one side or another and I literally had to fight to drive in a straight line.‚  Bottom line, stay on course away from walls and other racers.‚  The opportunity to pass will present itself and rushing into a closed door situation hoping to ram your way through will only have adverse negative consequences.

My main gripe with career mode was the lack of personal narrative.‚  Yes RACE Pro is a phenomenal racing simulator, but who am I? Why am I racing these races?‚  What’s my story?‚  Granted, this aspect won’t phase many gamers because you just want to race, I get that.‚  I’m a man for story though, and all SimBin had to do was let me create a character which I could grow attached to and see progress through the story, that would have created a better experience for me.

Career mode will take you anywhere from eighteen to twenty five hours to complete, given the difficulty setting and the number of times you have to repeat a race.‚  I finished up in just over twenty hours.‚  The second half of the game lost my interest somewhat due to the repetition of courses but with different car classes and number of laps.‚  However, I can easily see a true sim race fan with undying enthusiasm to complete every event with the most possible points in a record time.‚  While I would praise your efforts I am saddened by the fact you’ll only receive one puny 30 gamerscore achievement.

The other main feature mode in RACE Pro is Championship.‚  As a big Mario Kart fan, I am very used to the Grand Prix mentality.‚  I race a few races and earn points for the place I finish in, that’s familiar to me, I like it.‚  Well Championship mode is just that, minus the cute and cuddly Mario universe characters.‚  A championship consists of eleven races on different tracks around the globe.‚  Finish in whatever place you like, there is no bar, but if you want to come in first at the end, you’ll need to finish near the top every race.‚  I enjoyed Championship because before I began I was allowed to tweak every setting.‚  The number of AI, the number of laps, the difficulty of AI, my own difficulty.‚  It was all right there for me, and that kind of control in a user interface is refreshing.‚  Each vehicle class has a specific Championship to complete and depending on the number of laps you choose the duration of said championship can be anywhere from one hour on semi-pro with two laps, to much, much longer on Professional difficulty with the maximum number of laps.

Time Trial mode is fairly straightforward, you can either race against yourself or a ghost downloaded through Xbox Live.‚  Time Trial is the very best way to find faster routes through courses.‚  In RACE Pro, a hundredth of a second makes all the difference.‚  You’ll find that when racing your ghost or that of a top racer, your racing style is not what you thought it was.‚  You’ll say, I missed that corner real bad there, when in-game you might not have noticed.‚  I highly suggest you attack time trial mode before racing friends or through Xbox Live.

And finally, multiplayer in RACE Pro houses the lasting appeal.‚  You can race up to 11 of your friends via system link, or play head to head local multiplayer.‚  Hot Seat mode, an offline multi-player option allows you and friends to cooperatively race against each other without simultaneously driving.‚  And most importantly RACE Pro allows for 12 player online racing with both ranked and unranked matchmaking.‚  The host has control over number of laps, weather conditions and various other fine tuning elements.‚  My online experience was one hundred percent lag free, with a rare occasion of the connection timing out and forcing me back to the lobby.‚  Overall I got my butt kicked online and while the thought of competing against real, living and breathing opponents is compelling, I think I’m going to master my skills offline before I try again.

Having played hours and hours of Mario Kart and various other arcade style racers I must say RACE Pro was a true eye opener to the other end of the spectrum.‚  SimBin’s first effort on a console was extremely well executed with only petty detractors to the experience.‚  RACE Pro is approachable to first time racing sim gamers but SimBin clearly had experienced players in mind during development.‚  If you lack patience and are easily frustrated, RACE Pro will have you at times pulling hair and yelling at your TV.‚  However, if you persevere and take the time to learn and understand game-play mechanics, you will have fewer frustrating moments and more instances of pure elation.

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About The Author

Eddie Makuch is a Blast staff writer. Reach him at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @EddieMakuch.

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