Kittyokc's Full Review: NASCAR Thunder 2003 for PlayStation 2
I had been very happy with NASCAR Thunder 2002 after getting it as an early Christmas present last year. I enjoyed playing it for hours on end, then one day I went to play it and it wouldn't play. We were waiting until we had the money to replace it, when I saw an advertisement for NASCAR Thunder 2003 during one of the NASCAR races last season. Since the new one appeared to be much improved, we opted to wait until it came out in late September, boy am I glad we did!
Driver Choices
You can pick your favorite NASCAR driver or you can create your own car and driver. All the Winston Cup drivers are there and some Busch series drivers as well. Quite a few of the drivers have multiple paint schemes to choose from and some paint schemes will need to be unlocked depending on your performance in different parts of the game.
Tracks
All the tracks that the NASCAR Winston Cup series races at are there to choose from. Not only do you choose the track, but you can choose which race if it's a venue they go to more than once. There are even some made up tracks thrown in to make it more interesting, but they will have to be unlocked.
Playing the Game
When you first start the game, you can choose from a quick race, or choose a race mode, where you can choose to take a Lightning Challenge, earn Thunder Licenses or pick between Season or Career mode. The Lightning Challenge and Thunder License are newly added features for NASCAR Thunder 2003, they are fun but not easy.
Quick Race
You choose your driver, paint scheme and your track and compete in a single race against 42 other cars. The default setting has you racing 3% of the actual race, but in the settings you can change the percentage of the race you want, you can even choose 100% if you want and do a whole race.
Lightning Challenge
This one is newly added for NASCAR Thunder 20003, it is fun, but not so easy to win. First you pick which challenge you want to do from the list of over 30 MRN moments of the race. Each one has a little description and a little video from one of the drivers involved, telling you about the challenge. The challenges have a difficulty assigned to them: Rookie, Veteran or Legend, but don't be fooled, the Rookie challenges are not all that easy. If you complete the challenge, you will earn a Thunder plate, which will unlock paint schemes, sponsors, cars, tracks and drivers.
Thunder License
This is another new one added. Here you can get needed practice at the different tracks and learn from top NASCAR drivers. Here you choose your track and driver coach, once you start, listen to what your coach is telling you, he is helping you get around the track better. You have goals to meet for the different difficulties: Rookie, Veteran and Legend, the goals are the time to complete the laps.
Season Mode
With this mode you choose your driver or create a car, how many players (up to 4), and the schedule. With the schedule, you can choose from a preset number of races (12, 24 or 36), or you can choose custom, where you choose how many races and which tracks they are at. The custom schedule is the best, you can leave out the tracks that you are not good at and you can revisit your favorite track as many times as you want. If you win the championship, you will see yourself hoisting the Winston Cup series trophy.
Career Mode
This one is very similar to the Season mode as far as gameplay goes, but you are limited to using the create a car option instead of just choosing a car. You end up winning cash after the races and use that money to put back into your car by upgrading tires, engines, and pit crew training. This one is really challenging, mainly because you are not starting with the best equipment.
Race Weekend Menu
The quick race, season and career all have the race weekend menu which include...
Car Setup - Adjust your car for the track if needed.
Practice - Take as many practice laps as you want before qualifying and the race.
Qualify - To see where you start in the race. If you choose not to qualify you will start in the back of the field with Season or Career, or start in the middle of the pack with the quick race.
Start Race - This starts the race, you will be given a little intro to the track, top drivers for that track and the lineup, just hit the X button to skip over that to start the race.
Settings - You can fine tune some of the in game settings here, but not all game settings.
Quit - Returns you to the main menu.
Settings
Quick race and Season have it where you can adjust your settings for the game, you will need a memory card to save them. You have many settings to choose from, which include...
Gameplay
Difficulty - Here you choose from Rookie, Veteran, or Legend. The difficulty increases with experience, so starting off on Rookie is recommended for those just starting out.
Race Length - Here you choose the percentage of the race you want to run. You can choose from 3, 5, 10, 25, 50, or 100%. The default is set at 3%, if you choose to run the longer races, make sure you have the time to run them because they can take as long as the real races do, so if you don't have 3 or 4 hours, don't choose the full race.
Unlimited Fuel/Tires - You can choose this to be on or off. When it is in the on, you will never run out of fuel or tires, if it's off, you will need to pit for fuel and tires, which your crew chief will notify you when you need to, so you do need to pay attention to what he says.
Damage - Here you have three choices to choose from, on, limited or off. When in the on, if you get enough damage, you can be eliminated from the race. With limited, if you get too much damage you will be notified on-screen to repair, this can be done while racing and not losing positions. When in the off position, your car doesn't get damaged at all, no matter how bad you abuse it. I have used all of them and I prefer the limited, I was eliminated from a few races when I had the damage on. If you like to beat and bang while racing, you will want it on limited or off.
Yellow Flags - Here you can choose to have yellow flags to come out or not. When on, if a bad wreck happens or the track gets hazardous for some reason, the caution will come out. You race back to the line and then the computer takes over while under caution. The biggest thing that they changed between 2002 and 2003 is that you have quick cautions now. If you decide not to pit, the game will skip over the caution laps and go right back to giving you the green flag again. The caution laps count, they just basically fast forward through them to save time.
Display Settings
Leader Board - Here you can choose to have the leader board on or off. When on, it will give you the top 5 in running order every time you cross the line. You can see how far behind the leader you are, or how far behind the other top runners are if you're the leader. I always play with it on.
Info Display - Here you can choose whether or not to show the track or car damage in the upper left part of you screen, or nothing. When it shows the track, it will show all the cars on the track as dots and show where they are, kinda neat. If you choose damage, it will show a car and it will show the damage your car has sustained. If you choose none, nothing will be displayed. I usually have the track up so I can see the position of myself and the leader or vice versa.
Rear View Mirror - Here you choose to have the rear view mirror to be on or off. I always choose to have this on. When on, a rear view mirror will be in the center on the top of the screen, here you can see who's behind you and how fast they are moving up on you.
Camera Angle - Here you choose what your view is, you can choose from close chase, far chase, bumper, cockpit or roof. Each one gives you a different view, this really depends on your preferences. I have tried all of them and which one you choose really depends on how comfortable you are in your car.
Widescreen - This option allows you to view the game in widescreen.
Controller Settings
There is a default setting for the controller, but you can go into the controller settings and change it. I have not played with these settings at all.
Car Setup
With the car setup there is a default setting for each track, but you can change the setup to suit your needs in the car setup menu. You can change the transmission, tire pressure, spoiler, suspension, wedge and gear ratio. You have to play around with these at each of the tracks and find what works best with the car, so if you change anything, run a lot of practice laps.
Create a Car
Here you can create your very own NASCAR car to race with. For the car itself, you select the make, paint scheme, and number (3 digit number only). Then you get to choose the colors and sponsors.
Graphics
I thought the graphics were great on NASCAR Thunder 2002, but they seemed to improve the graphics for NASCAR Thunder 2003. The cars seem to display more smoothly than before and they have also improved the visibility of the damage to the cars.
Control - The control is pretty good. A lot more depends on the setup of your car, so it may seem a bit more difficult at first. What was easy in 2002 may be more challenging for you in 2003. You can choose to use the control pad to control the steering of the car, the analog stick, or attach a steering wheel.
Sound
The sounds of the game are great. The sounds of the engines seems to be improved over the 2002 edition. Your spotters can be encouraging or annoying, it all depends on how well you're doing in the race. They added more music in the game, whereas 2002 only had two, 2003 has four different songs: Magic Carpet Ride, Get Away, Circles and Get Outta My Dreams, Get Into My Car.
My Thoughts
Being a huge NASCAR fan, I love this game, it's even better than NASCAR Thunder 2002, which I gave high ratings. I'm having a lot of fun with it, I've done a few seasons with a few different drivers and even won some too. I've gained some Thunder Licenses and even won a few Lightning Challenges, although my nine year old is better at the challenges than I am, he's actually won a few Veteran challenges.
I definitely recommend NASCAR Thunder 2003 to any NASCAR or racing fan, it's fun to play, can be very challenging at times, and you might even learn a thing or two about car setups if you play around with them a lot. The sounds of the game, while nowhere near as loud as the real thing, gives you a pretty good idea of what you're putting the engine through while going around the track and then you also have the sound of metal to metal when you bump or crash, which I have to admit, I've done a lot, I've even wrecked out of a few races.
While not the real thing, NASCAR Thunder 2003 can help you with your racing fix during the off season. If you're like me, you're probably going crazy waiting for the season to start! If you love racing, NASCAR or are a fan of NASCAR Thunder 2002, this is a must-have game!
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