Top 50 Video Games: Number 48

Stats of Import
Platform: Playstation 2
Absurdly Specific Genre: Moving Violation Efficiency Trainer
Difficulty: 4, ramping up to absurd levels towards the end
Beaten: No. I got about as far in this game as everyone gets in racing games - just long enough to unlock all the awesome crap. The last few stages that I beat had me cursing the names of the developers, which I specifically looked up so that I could curse them.

I ask for so precious little in a racing game - fluid controls, cool cars, high speeds, and the ability to destroy my opponents in fiery wrecks. So few are able to meet my meager demands.

Carmageddon had the last one in ample supply. Not so much the first three.

Assuming that these are my criteria for a decent racing game, the Burnout series stands alone amongst the myriad. Its controls simple, yet intuitive; the cars you could drive looked vaguely like cars someone might drool over; you could drive at high speeds, and were in fact rewarded for doing so. With just these factors, Burnout 3 would've been a great racer - then you threw in the crashes.

Crashing opponents cars (without losing control yourself) was the name of the game in Burnout. Push an opponent off the road? Gain turbo. Push an opponent into a bridge support? Extra turbo. Cause a twenty car pileup the likes of which would haunt the evening news for months? Lots and lots of turbo - which you'd use to create even more crashes in a glorious cycle.

Yeah. I made that in MS Paint in like 2 minutes. Don't say I don't go all out for this.

As enjoyable and satisfying as the single player mode was, Party Crash mode was deliriously enjoyable. In this mode, you were given a few blocks of traffic with the express intent of causing as much damage as possible. Scattering wreckage across as large an area as you could while gaining multipliers and trying to one-up your friends in the greatest game of 'HORSE' imaginable.

I'm not a big fan of racing games (I'm pretty sure this is the only one on this list), but Burnout 3 is undeniable.