Spilt Sercond Verlercity

Split Second/Velocity

Split second velocity is a racing game, in which you can total enemy cars by ramming them or the games main attraction, sabotaging the race tack with set pieces such as collapsing building, plane crashes and exploding certain pieces. These environmental disasters also change the track significantly all within a couple seconds, so you're going to have to adapt quickly if you want win. The cars in-game all use automatic gear changes, a decidedly good decision considering all the action on screen would make it nigh on impossible.

The games graphics are really well done with most outstanding being the particle effects you see when you see the explosions or watch the buildings crumble away.

The game devs decided to use a small but sleek HUD that sits behind the car with it's width matching the car. This was a fantastic idea as the car is where you're eyes will be trained on for most of the time, it also means you can see more of the beautiful environment they worked on.

The music used in-game are those that have a quick tempo, that sets a tense atmosphere surrounding the races, although this music, by default, can be hard to hear over the screeching of cars around the bends. This is however viable for change in the options menu and purely subject to opinion.

The fun to be found in this game lies in the various different ways to play this game. This added with the (blue shell factor)* makes multi-player even more addictive, especially when you screw over your friends with an abrupt plane crash. Those who have started to get the hang of the games mechanics can expect awesome indirect vehicular warfare, with dastardly schemes to make use of the environmental changes to it's up-most potential.

*I have named this after the usage of the blue shell in the Mario kart games, the blue shell is an overpowered item that is given out to players who are low in place on the leader board. As a result, this 1^st place seeking, homing missile quickly changes the balance of the leader-board, that can result the people in last place coming in first. Also it is really annoying to be hit by, while a guilty pleasure to use, especially when you see the smug look twist into one of rage.

As for the re-playability, it lies within the ranking online and the achievements awarded in-game. Being at the top of the leader-boards or earning an achievement, results in having the rank/achievement decal placed on your car. Meaning that by the time the budding achievement hunter collects most, if not all of them, (s)he will have them plastered all over his car so (s)he can show them off to the world.

I highly recommend you buy this game if you are looking for some arcade racing as it only costs between 10 and 5 pounds. While providing an action packed yet unique racing experience, especially for playing with your friends. If you are looking for a racing game with more realism and manual gear changing you'd be better off looking elsewhere like Forza or the (GTR) Fiat GT Racing games.