Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2996 in Computer & Video Games
• Brand: Atari
• Released on: 2006-09-08
• Rating: To Be Announced
• Platform: Xbox 360
• Number of items: 1

X360 July 06
"Test Drive Unlimited, quite simply, is awesome."

Manufacturer's Description
Test Drive Unlimited is the ultimate automotive experience for car and bike enthusiasts alike. Visit the most sophisticated car and bike dealers to purchase new vehicles or simply take them for a spin. Collect and trade rare performance parts and customise each vehicle to make it one-of-a-kind. Test Drive Unlimited challenges players online to experience the most exotic and fastest vehicles on more than 1000 miles of diverse Hawaiian roads. Gamers win races, challenges, missions and tournaments to earn credits and purchase new cars, bikes, rare performance parts, clothes, apparel, homes and garages.

First and foremost, the game encompasses a lot more than just racing. The player creates a custom avatar that other players will see driving his vehicle the same way a Massively Multiplayer online game. The idea is that the developers wanted the player to be able to put him- or herself into the game, so you can select your clothes, head model, glasses, etc. to create an avatar that looks like yourself, sort of along the lines of what you can do in a lot of recent football and basketball games. Then, when you go out driving, you will see this model in the car driving around in impressive detail.

At home you can change your character's clothes and other attributes to better match your personality. You can even take a spin down to the local clothing store and pick up some new gear. If you've grown tired of your surroundings, you can buy a new house as well.

Further continuing the customization aspects, players will be able to set up their own house and even decorate it with your own car photographs on the walls. The main options: not only saving points; ability to buy a bigger house and garage, with swimming pool, view, etc. That's where you get the news, store your car collection, tweak and tune your cars etc. Other locations include private clubs, public places such as car parks where you meet up with other inline players.

Feel like you need a change in your ride? No problem. Take a spin down to the car dealership and pick up a new car to add to your garage. You can fully customize all of your vehicles and then make a living by selling them online via the in-game auction system. It is very similar to eBay in that other players are able to see what you're selling and buy it via a stock exchange related system. If you set your price too high, you won't get many buyers, but set the price just right and you'll bring home the bacon.

All items you can buy use in-game credits, so don't think you'll be spending any real cash. New aftermarket parts, cars, bikes, clothing and apparel will become available via downloadable content every month.

All set up with trendy gear and clothes, tweaked and tuned dream supercar, membership in a top notch club? Your next officially sanctioned inter-club competition is still 2 hours away? Why don't you just drive down the alley and look for a challenger among the other online players driving now over the island?

ONLINE COMPONENTS: OFFLINE IS ONLINE
Imagine what you would do in your car fanatic fantasy world. That's what TDU delivers online:

• Wake up, dress up, choose car, tune it, leave your house
• Drive freely in the streets of Hawaii, and meet other online players in the street
• Challenge whoever you want for a quick race you choose the goal, the bet, the path, the rules
• Go to your private club to meet your friends chat, trade, prepare the next race
• Time for the official competition Watch your friends races on in-game G4 TV while waiting for your race

Customer Reviews

You Either Love it or Hate it
Test Drive Unlimited boasts a huge range of cars and bikes and acres of road with no boundaries. This sounds appealing and actually works very well. The Graphics are good so drive around the island exploring and enjoying the scenery is fun for a while. However it can only last so long before you get fed up of it and want to start racing, and that is when the game gets a lot worse.

The races are all very similar and just very ordinary and boring, there are other missions to do such as Hitchhikers, delivery missions and Car transport missions, but all of these are essentially the same, the only thing that changes is what you are delivering. This is a massive let down for the game and takes a lot of fun out of it.

The open-ended game play also means that there is no story at all running through the game and you may well end up thinking "what's the point?".

Some people I have spoken to though really love this game and think it is great to just be able to drive round the island for hours on end, however for me this is not my idea of a racing game. So, Boring as hell or the perfect escapism? That's for you to decide but I seriously recommend trying this game out at a friends house or renting it first. That way you definately won't be dissapointed.

Things you do not want to do on Test Drive!
When I first got the game I did not know what to do and I started to crash into cars but then I found out that the cops come after you and I got pulled over so do not et into trouble with the police because they can take your money away.
Do not go bank robbed because its really hard to earn all the money back without spending it!
By the way BUY A LAMBORGHINI THEY WILL CHANGE YOUR LIFE!

Great Game
this game is brilliant, after playing it on the demo that comes with the xbox 360 i had to buy it, i love just driving round, not being forced to do any races like on the older need for speeds, it does lack the little things that make a game great like use of indicators and little things like that (although you can do the windows), but its still definitly a 5 star game