The Test Drive series is one of gaming's oldest racing franchises around; starting on the days of the Commodore 64, and later the bigger consoles such as the Genesis and eventually, up to the Dreamcast. However, many times the series wasn't as legendary as many might lead you to believe, as entries such as Test Drive 4-6 fell in the mediocre to poor categories.

With that in mind, developer Pitbull Syndicate, along with publisher Atari (Infogrames), decided to reinvent the series on the current generation of consoles, as well as the PC. Test Drive was born - missing any numbers designating a sequel; a true reinvention of the series. Technically, a good job was done in making the game look nice visually, with a decent (albeit lazy) difficulty, a good selection of cars, and use of the custom soundtrack for the Xbox. However, they forgot the one important think about this game - fun. Simply, Test Drive is technically competent, but about as thrilling as watching paint dry. It's cheap now, as one of the early members of the Xbox Platinum Hits line (as it is on PS2 - see how games sell on name value?), but with other, better racers like Rallisport Challenge and Project Gotham Racing also for the same $20 price, it's just not worth it, because it's just not exciting enough to be worthy of a purchase.

The Facts

In a rare twist, Test Drive features a basic story for the Underground mode. You play Dennis Black, a known street racer, who's summoned by a former racer who apparently wrapped himself around a tree and can't race anymore. Your job is to join the Test Drive league of street racers - they use the Test Drive moniker to avoid some legal problems (i.e. people don't usually like those who race their cars at high speeds on city streets - that's why it's illegal street racing, and all - c'mon, you've seen Fast & The Furious). Along with a mix of oddball characters that you race, Mr. Black competes in numerous races throughout the world - San Francisco, Tokyo, and London, to name a few. As you progress, you unlock new cars to use, from older cars like the Pontiac GTO (like the one in xXx, to the new beasts like a Dodge Viper and some rice rockets (hey, I didn't come up with that phrase) as well.

If this doesn't really interest you, there's not much else, besides single races and quick, random races. Admittedly, there's plenty of variety in track design - there's an equal amount of circuit, lapped tracks, and the more traditional point-to-point tracks. However, you do have to progress through the Underground to open up more places to race, so it becomes a necessary evil.

The Playtest

Veterans of the Test Drive series will notice all the usual traits of the game when playing - good track design, cops hellbent on putting an end to your test drive (kinda contradicts what was said earlier, but that's what the wacky British guy said when he was getting Mr. Black to drive for him), and spot-on controls. As I said, this game is technically competent.

The racing is checkpoint based, with a timer. Because of this, it's necessary to avoid making too many mistakes in order to get to a checkpoint before time runs out, though it's really not too hard. Scattered around the courses are also jumps that are set up, that will give you a few more seconds of time to complete a course. Also, all tracks are loaded with other traffic, and people - hitting them will cause problems, but not as bad as say, Burnout's insane crashes.

The artificial intelligence is purely of the rubberband form - you can never, ever get very far ahead, and never get too far behind; you can actually see the opposing cars slow down ahead of you, so catching up is easy. That said though, the AI is ferociously tough anyway, and pretty smart, boxing you out and not letting you manhandle them into walls. Finesse is the only real way to win, though I've noticed that doing a perfect race does not mean you'll win sometimes - luck can be involved, if you can convince the others to give up to the police. If you get caught yourself by the cops, you can still race; it just slows you down and forces you into 6th place.

Usually, this kind of AI would annoy me, as I don't much care for rubberband AI, while a tough, fair computer opponent is more my speed. But in this case, I find it hard to really even care. Every time I sat down to play Test Drive, I'd race a few races, and wonder why even bother playing, because it's so mundane and uneventful. Despite challenging races and loads of traffic and police to get in your way, the game fails to be interesting. Honestly, Test Drive depresses me, because it has every possible aspect down technically that makes for a great racer - the arcade feel is down pat and works so well - but when a game is so incredibly boring and lacking intensity, it means jack squat.

To put it in perspective, put this in mind - when the game is loading, you get to play a madly tough game of Pong against a crazy hard computer opponent (or a friend if you're playing multiplayer). The sad thing is, this Pong game is 100x more thrilling and interesting and fun than Test Drive. How sad is it (or how much poetic justice it is that a graphically superior game is utterly boring compared to it) that one of the first modern video games is still more interesting and fun than a racing game that's made to get your heart pumping?

The Looks

Despite being built for the technically inferior PlayStation 2 in mind, Test Drive does look pretty good on the Xbox. I could do without the lackluster presentation, but the cars are detailed really well and look like their real-life counterparts. Even with loads of traffic on screen, the game doesn't slow down, and night or day, the tracks and surrounding environments are impressive - I especially enjoy the outstanding London scenery; it's definitely beautiful. Unfortunately, despite all the crashing that can go on, there's no damage model, making them look like a kids' Hot Wheels accident, with cars flying around and not taking any dents or bumps or explosions. Shame.

However, there's a real big problem besides a damage model - a sense of speed. The engine renders practically zero sense of speed, making a 180 MPH race through Tokyo streets seem like a 40 MPH backup on Interstate 10. This just lends more emphasis to the point that Test Drive is mind-bogglingly boring and lifeless - it just feels slow, even with the high-end cars you race with. When you actually have time to admire scenery and environments in a level, and take eyes off the track, something is certainly wrong.

The Sounds

The best thing going for the sound department is the use of custom soundtracks. Without this, the lifeless (bet you'd never guess!) music that plays normally would be horrid. Thanks to the custom soundtrack, you can listen to whatever you want, no matter what it is. Of course, there's a small problem with Test Drive's custom soundtrack - it repeats the same song within a race. So if you're in a long race, get used to the same song again and again until you hate it and remove it from your Xbox hard drive.

Besides that, there's little else to really talk about - the voice acting of the various characters is done pretty well, and they found good voices for each stereotype. Besides that, the only effects you'll hear come from people screaming when you get close to hitting them, police sirens chasing you, the squeal of tires, and the crunching of cars banging against each other. It's competent, but nothing spectacular.

The Bottom Line

While a good majority of this game is fine, the important things - sense of speed, and exciting racing - are nowhere to be seen. Thanks to that, Test Drive falls in the back of the pack in a crowded field of Xbox racers, and unless you've played all the great ones (such as this pitiful author has), Test Drive is not worth the bother of picking it up (on the other hand, if you HAVE played them all, this is worth perhaps a desperate look, or a pickup used/rental). You're better off checking out Project Gotham or Rallisport for the same price; they'll offer the whole package of racing excitement.

Some Other Xbox Racers

Apex
Colin McRae Rally 3
Moto GP 2

Recommended: No