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Car-combat hits the next-generation. Interestingly enough the game comes from Pseudo Interactive whose Cel Damage brought the first car-combat game to the Xbox during its launch. Unlike Cel Damage, though, Full Auto drops the cel shaded graphics for some realistic and stunning next-generation graphics. The fundamental gameplay, though, doesn’t have the scope you’d expect from a next-generation title.
The game sports a career mode, arcade mode, two-player mode and online multiplayer via Xbox Live. The arcade mode is basically a quick play mode that lets you race on whatever you’ve unlocked. The two-player mode is pretty self-explanatory. The career mode is where the fun is at. You’ll begin with a decent vehicle and decent weapons, and you’ll unlock more powerful weapons, better cars (about 20 total), new paint jobs and new events. As you play through the career mode, you’ll also get new medals. To do this, you’ll participate in a number of races, each with its own nuance.
Despite the nuances, though, most of the races dissolve into you finishing in first place. However, the game includes a number of races. You’ll find the typical races, knockout races (the last place racer at the end of each lap is eliminated), rampage races (cars with the goal of destroying you litter the track), point-to-point, and a variation of that called down-and-back (race to a point, then turn around and go back).
The core gameplay is satisfying but not as fleshed out as it could have been. The cars in the game aren’t typical cars; each has two weapons, usually one in the front and one in the back. You’ll unlock additional weapons but instead of unlocking individual weapons, you’ll unlock pairs. The available weapons include shotguns, grenades and rocket launchers. This is still a racing game though. Sliding through corners will fill your boost meter which will eventually unlock a turbo boost. Further, there is an unwreck feature that lets you rewind a few seconds of the action.
As I mentioned above, the game supports up to eight players via Xbox Live. You’ll find the typical Xbox Live features in the game like leaderboards, and such but nothing out of the ordinary.
The game’s graphics are stunning, for the most part. The car models are excellently modeled, look great, and can absorb a whole lot of very well rendered damage. You can really see these cars get destroyed. The lighting is also good, though the explosions look especially nice. The different race tracks are somewhat standard fare but they all look good enough. Unfortunately, sometimes the Xbox 360 chugs to get all of this running. It’s particularly a problem in the two-player mode and when the game zooms in for replays.
The game’s audio is decent. The background music is made of electronica which sounds alright. Unfortunately, the game doesn’t let you use custom soundtracks. This is disappointing since every other game does as it is a hardwired feature of the console. Nonetheless, the sound effects are decent but they aren’t anything special.
Full Auto is a respectable first-entry for car combat games on the Xbox 360. The game could use a bit more variety, but the included race types, different cars and weapons, and decent replay value somewhat balance it out. It isn’t Twisted Metal Black, but a respectable first entry nonetheless. -- Jose Liz, PGNx Media
---- Mar 8, 2006
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