Burnout: Dominator

The Good
Let's be honest, Burnout 4 was a mistake. Transforming same-way traffic from an obstacle into a weapon killed the hope for Burnout to be anything more than a visual effects demo. When Criterion started working on their next iteration of Burnout the task of making something to be released in the meantime fell on the shoulders of EA UK. They could have taken the game mechanics as they were and whipped up a thoughtless new tracks+cars iteration, as is unfortunately common with the portable versions of franchise games. Amazingly EA UK took the time to look at what made Burnout games work, and ended up producing the best entry in the franchise.

Obviously, traffic checking has been removed entirely. All of the cars on the track are a threat to you, either the immediate threat of crashing into traffic, or of your rival cars ramming you into obstacles. The danger of other cars is what makes the lure of the boost you can earn, either by nearly missing traffic or by forcing opponents into obstacles, so engaging. The lure of boost is also what makes Dominator's defining mechanic, boost chaining, so brilliant. For years now arcade racing games have had boosts, but so few have expanded the concept of boosting beyond "go faster when you really need it". Bollocks to that, says EA UK, who doesn't want to boost all the time?

Dominator's boost chaining is a source of constant feedback between the player and the track. By starting a full boost a timer starts. If, in the time it takes a boost to run out, the player manages to do enough dangerous driving, or take down an opponent, then a second boost bar will be filled and a chain of boosts started. Can't earn a full bar of boost in time? Stop boosting at any time before burning it all, even with a filled second bar? In both cases your extra boost is whiffed and the chain lost. Dominator is, at all times, about prioritizing every part of the track for risk vs reward, and fighting against your opponents, the track, and anyone else close at hand to keep that boost going.

Thankfully the developers realised that this was their best idea, and every game mode incorporates it in some way. High boost chains add a multiplier used in challenges based around points like drifting and near miss, while the requirement to finish a full bar of boost before the next is awarded adds second-by-second tension to any of the races against AI cars.

Another element that surprised me was, of all things, EA Trax. For once they have actually managed to put together a licensed soundtrack that is appropriate for the game. Note that I do not say good. Some of the music is terrible, but it all has the kind of energy and mood that a game like this requires, and overall the experience is improved by it. Yes, even Avril Lavigne's Girlfriend(seriously open up the menu and turn on (it's turned off by default!) the Mandarin version of Girlfriend. It's hilarious.)

The Bad
It might as well be said that crash mode is not in this iteration of Burnout, but it's not so much missing as it's been omitted. The puzzle aspect of crash mode doesn't really have any place in the fast paced reaction gameplay of Dominator. It's to EA UK's credit that they choose to focus on the good game that they knew they could make rather than over extending themselves in order to pad out their feature list.

It is kind of unfortunate that the PSP was the lead platform for the game. While Dominator looks good enough, and better on the PS2 than the PSP, it is a significant downgrade from the home console focused 3 and 4. One problem that still plagues the series is keeping the information on screen readable while moving at outrageous speeds. Most hazards are marked by yellow lights, and you can usually make out same-way and incoming traffic by their lights, but the few times you can't are still where you'll end up crashing. There are also a few times where sliding along a track barrier wall will smash you into a barely visible obstacle that's indistinguishable from all the other obstacles that the barrier will carry you right past. The only thing you can do in that situation is to memorize the track.

Finally a minor qualm I have with all modern EA games: the insulting mandatory tutorial. It's short, and you'll get past it into the real game soon enough, but it's still poorly designed, is entirely unwilling to let you learn the game mechanics on your own, and isn't even comprehensive. The game also plays an unskippable video showing what car you can win on a track even if it's your fifth time playing the track and have no intention of ever unlocking that car (since most of the garage is filled with nothing more than different shells on the same stats).Finally another new feature of the game are the "Signature Shortcuts", shortcuts that are permanently unlocked by smashing a rival car into them. In practice actually pulling this off is based on luck, only, and they all should have been open from the start. The only reason they have to be unlocked is so that the game has more things it can tick off on the track to 100% completion.

The Bottom Line
When Burnout Dominator clicks, it becomes a synesthetic rapport between player and game. Each moment the player is in struggle with their environment to earn that last bit of boost they need without wiping out. Rival racers still don't quite have good enough AI to make them convincing opposition, but they can also be thought of as agents of the track; white blood cells that follow along and spring forward at just that moment to break your concentration. The game pushes you to lose yourself in it, to become one with your car, and engaging the game like this has made it one of the most enjoyable racing game experiences of the decade for me.