It seems that at this year’s E3, every large publisher had a hit racing game and for me, that was pretty awesome. In this 4 part mini-series, I’ll be looking at my experiences with each one of them.  Let’s run down the list right quick then:

• Microsoft Game Studios – Forza Motorsport 3
• Electronic Arts – Need For Speed Shift
• Activision – Blur
• Disney Interactive Studios – Split/Second

While all these were playable, the game that probably topped my list and was pretty much the sole reason why I wanted a PlayStation 3, was not playable at E3, after numerous years in development. Yes, that title was Gran Turismo 5 and after asking Sony if they had a playable version, they simply sent me to the handheld substitute, Gran Turismo PSP, which was quite saddening.  I was really aching to get my hands on it!

Now that that is out of the way, let’s get to my impressions of the four games mentioned previously that I actually got hands on time with.  I’ll save the best for last, so the closer the game is to the end, the more I enjoyed it. So how about we get this show on the road?

Electronic Arts – Need For Speed SHIFT

Going into E3, this was the title that I had seen quite a bit of, but due to the NFS Series being taken in a “new” direction, I was also the most worried about it.  As it turns out, my worries about the game were somewhat realized when I first played it. The game was located in 3 areas at E3: in the EA booth (of course), in the Microsoft booth (only one playable unit), and in between the two halls in a central hallway. I primarily played the game in the central hallway as we passed by it quite often transferring between the two halls.

My first playthrough was a fun but frustrating one. I decided I would take a Pagani Zonda R around one of the tracks they had available.  Knowing that this car has a ton of power and is extremely light, I knew it would be very tail-happy.  However, I never expected it to be this difficult to control, and add to that, as most people know, I play a ton of racing games. I finished that race and vowed to come back and master the game, which sadly, I didn’t manage to actually do.

Over the three days E3 was on, I came by that booth and played Shift a couple times, each time learning more about the game, its controls, and its gameplay elements. The more I played it, the more I seemed to understand it, as experience inany game comes. However, due to this, the learning curve seemed much more steep than any of the other racers I played.  Granted, I was never “eased” into the experience, but I can definitely see how you would need to spend some time figuring out the game to make sure you can even play it. To me, it didn’t seem as if this game was very easy to pick up and play if you hadn’t already had some training in it.

Overall, unless EA provided a demo with SHIFT, I would be inclined to pass on this due to it’s complexity. Granted, none of the point generation was really to scale or working as to specifications, according to the folks manning the stations, so that critical part of the game was not really available to be played around with.  I was really looking forward to SHIFT as it was supposed to be putting a GRID spin on the NFS series, and I really enjoyed GRID, but SHIFT seems to have done away with the arcade-like fun that was in GRID.

Look out for the next part of this mini-series starring Activision’s Blur.