Is Asphalt Injection for the PlayStation Vita any good?

By: Musa Afridi

  |   September 30th, 2012   |  

Uncategorized

Part 1: Ubisoft’s racer feels like the child of the Need for Speed and Burnout series, but does that make it a great game or a pretender that does not live up to the mark?

When it comes to variety and choice in terms of the games on offer, one can tell that Sony is trying extremely hard to try and meet the needs of every PlayStation Vita user. However, it still feels as if the library has a number of empty shelves and just a few books in each.

The racing section of that particular metaphorical library seems to have the fewest books on offer, as does the shooter section. The latter however, has been had a number of games announced with Black Ops: Declassified and Killzone: Mercenary.

On the other hand, the racing section has very little to offer apart from WipEout 2048 and Ridge Racer, both of which were launch window titles. The lack of any of the big names such as DiRT, a proper Need for Speed game or Burnout, means that the gamer is starved for choice. There is Formula One but that too doesn’t have the kind of Ferraris and Mustangs that many players want to be driving around at break neck speeds.

Ubisoft seem to have noticed this and have released Asphalt Injection, which may sound a lot like it belongs on mobile phones, however, it packs quite a punch. First things first, the visuals are pretty impressive, not as good as Uncharted but the car models are nicely rendered and the tracks have enough detail to keep you immersed.

At the same time, Gameloft, the developers, have done a great job at delivering the illusion of travelling at break neck speeds, something the Burnout and recent Need for Speed games had perfected. Upon using the boost the colours in the world change, the lights blur and the car accelerates to around 400km/h depending on the skill of the driver.

The boost system is similar to many games in the same adrenaline induced, seat of your pants racers with driving recklessly and dangerously rewarding players with boost bars. Driving on the wrong side of the road, missing oncoming traffic by narrow margins and drifting all add to the boost bar, which is split into various tiers. Filling the bar up all the way unlocks the longest sustained boosts.

At the same time boost drops are spread out throughout the track and add almost a Blur or karting element to the game, which again only adds to Asphalt Injection’s arcade feel.

Read on in Part 2

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are the writer’s own and do not reflect the editorial policy of wishfree.com in any way.