Carmageddon: Max Damage Review

<p>The car combat genre feels like a product of the &&num;8217&semi;90s that never quite managed to meet the modern era&period; Even popular titles like <em>Twisted Metal <&sol;em>tried to modernize and establish new fans to the series&period; It didn&&num;8217&semi;t really work out&period; While car combat games were hugely popular in the same time as heavy metal riffs in hard rock songs&comma; the aesthetic and vibe isn&&num;8217&semi;t usually capable of transferring to 2016&period; What&&num;8217&semi;s unfortunate about <em>Carmageddon&colon; Max Damage<&sol;em> is that it could have easily been one of the better car combat games if it didn&&num;8217&semi;t rely on appealing to only fans of the <em>Carmageddon <&sol;em>franchise&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>When I first started up <em>Carmageddon&colon; Max Damage<&sol;em>&comma; I thought I had been transported back in time&comma; but in a good way&period; The in-your-face aesthetic of cheesy hard rock riffs and characters named &&num;8220&semi;Die Anna&&num;8221&semi; amplifies the feeling that this is a game from a whole other era&period; <em>Carmageddon <&sol;em>was a series about being offensive in its carnage &&num;8211&semi; blood was never shied away from&period; In that respect&comma; <em>Max Damage <&sol;em>does exactly what its original incarnation set out to do&period; The heart is there and the game manages to capitalize on its crimson-drenched traditions&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Game modes can have you being forced to hunt out a specific pedestrian to mow down with your car&comma; or to take out other drivers&comma; or even just race&period; The Classic Carmageddon mode gives players three different ways of defeating it&colon; kill all the pedestrians&comma; kill all the drivers or hit all the checkpoints&period; In theory&comma; this a great idea&period; There is a time limit that pushes players to focus on something&comma; but you could hypothetically spread yourself thin and try doing multiple things at once&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;110252" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-110252" style&equals;"width&colon; 1920px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"wp-image-110252 size-full" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2016&sol;07&sol;03121808&sol;Carmageddon&lowbar;&lowbar;Max&lowbar;Damage&lowbar;20160413111506&period;jpg" alt&equals;"Carmageddon&colon; Max Damage" width&equals;"1920" height&equals;"1080" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-110252" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;<em>Carmageddon&colon; Max Damage<&sol;em>&comma; U &amp&semi; I Entertainment&comma; LLC&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>If you were to try something so brazen&comma; you might find yourself running into issues&comma; though&period; As much as I love the game&&num;8217&semi;s bloodlust and potential for experimentation&comma; it is hindered by one very important thing for a car combat game&colon; the driving is not fun&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s straight up infuriating&period; Most cars handle terribly and the ones that are manageable require a lot of determination to get them to your goal&period; Killing pedestrians is no problem really&comma; but trying to take out another car or race on a track is initially pretty difficult&period; I got accustomed to the clunky handling&comma; but always felt like I was on the verge of losing control&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>It also doesn&&num;8217&semi;t help that the game doesn&&num;8217&semi;t offer much in terms of interesting content&period; There are lots of cars to unlock&comma; and you can even customize them&period; But it never feels like much of a difference&period; Unless you go from one of the purposefully frustrating cars to drive to one of the better &lpar;but still difficult to handle&rpar; cars&period; When it comes to interesting content&comma; the game has a hard time maintaining itself after a fairly strong start&period; The career mode quickly introduces you to a couple modes and then later on introduces another one that is kind of interesting&comma; but just like the other modes&comma; gets tiresome after a couple races&period; There are also &&num;8220&semi;Stealworthy&&num;8221&semi; cars that can be obtained by destroying that specific car during an event&comma; which will help increase the amount of death machines in your garage&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;110251" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-110251" style&equals;"width&colon; 1920px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"wp-image-110251 size-full" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2016&sol;07&sol;03121826&sol;Carmageddon&lowbar;&lowbar;Max&lowbar;Damage&lowbar;20160412181435&period;jpg" alt&equals;"Carmageddon&colon; Max Damage" width&equals;"1920" height&equals;"1080" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-110251" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;<em>Carmageddon&colon; Max Damage<&sol;em>&comma; U &amp&semi; I Entertainment&comma; LLC&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>If the driving was fun or if these modes weren&&num;8217&semi;t all introduced so quickly&comma; then that might have helped&period; But what exacerbates the feeling of torture is how many times the game wants you to play the same game modes&period; Sure&comma; you could say that all racing games offer the same race over and over&period; The difference is that progression doesn&&num;8217&semi;t seem to exist in <em>Carmageddon&colon; Max Damage<&sol;em>&period; I unlocked parts&comma; but I never felt like I got better at the game or really deserved them&period; You unlock things by just getting to a certain point in the campaign&period; But I frequently felt like I was just grinding through the campaign for no real purpose&period; The upgrades never feel consequential and the fact that the cars consistently handle poorly makes getting them even less rewarding&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>There&&num;8217&semi;s a currency in the game&comma; but it is used for unlocking power ups which can admittedly be pretty fun to use&period; You also use the currency to repair your car on-the-fly&period; The animation is smooth and it looks awesome to see your car go from being split in two to being whole again in real-time&period; There are performance issues that arise from too much happening on the screen&comma; but <em>Max Damage <&sol;em>is often able to keep its cool&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>If you don&&num;8217&semi;t really want to mess with the Career mode&comma; you do have the option to partake in multiplayer and freeplay events&period; Freeplay seems like a large waste of time though as unlocks come mostly from Career mode&period; Multiplayer is a good idea in concept&comma; but when you have cars that all handle like garbage&comma; it&&num;8217&semi;s difficult to find the redeeming qualities&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>There is a solid game built on the surface of <em>Carmageddon&colon; Max Damage<&sol;em>&comma; but it starts faltering once someone pokes at its foundations&period; Driving should be fun&comma; but it&&num;8217&semi;s arguably the most infuriating thing in the game besides its front-loaded career mode that fails to maintain entertainment value&period; A story could have helped&period; It probably wouldn&&num;8217&semi;t help much&comma; but it at least would hide some of the very ugly seams stitching the game together&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s in-your-face and abrasive&comma; but without solid gameplay&comma; it fails to be more than another failed attempt at reviving a dead genre&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;