Blur - Single-Player Hands On Preview

Blur's multiplayer beta, which had done the rounds as a closed beta over Xbox Live until it became public at the beginning of April, has proved one thing above all else: Blur will be awesome. Of course, awesome is as awesome does, and Bizarre has had to demonstrate this all over again following its acquisition by supposed evil empire Activision. The fanboys certainly gave Bizarre a bit of a drilling when Blur originally came to light last year: 'Bizarre Creations does Mario Kart style power-ups, bleugh!' the internet appeared to remark (this journalist included). But the Liverpool based studio has proved all the haters wrong by building a power-up system so well balanced and deep in its scope, and yet addictively simple in its precision, that you just can't help but love the resulting gameplay.

Make no mistake: the power-ups in Blur are by far and away the stars of the show and not, as is usually the case with driving games, the cars or tracks. Vehicle handling is certainly of the brick-like variety, with drifting that is hardly elemental to your success but still, regardless of its heavy feel, requires a deft touch to pull advantages from its use. Tracks don't over complicate the matter either: circuits tend to offer multiple routes through a section at one time or another - where a tangential route may be quicker but the main route dishes out more power-ups - and the tracks are certainly not without their visual flair, but there's nothing groundbreaking for the genre here. Ocean-going cruise ships being pulled into the path of opponents at the touch of a button, there are not.

Given the virtuosic mastery of vehicles and track design that Bizarre has demonstrated with PGR in the past, you'd be forgiven for thinking that the studio was downplaying these elements in Blur, as if the developers want to turn down the volume of everything else so that the power-ups take centre-stage. In fact, we have the sneaking suspicion that this might be Bizarre's intention exactly. There are still oodles of cars in the game; all of them officially licensed with their own strengths and weaknesses as well as that certain je ne sais quoi that sets each vehicle apart. The tracks are designed with Blur's particular brand of rugged action and carnage in mind as well: wide sprawling corners and straights as wide as runways then taper down into tight, congested sections to mix-up the racing tempo. But as good as all of this is, it just doesn't grab you by both fists and shake you with exuberant glee like the power-ups do (for a more detailed explanation as to why, click through here).

Nonetheless, judging by our recent hands-on with the game's single-player component, Bizarre has been improving on Blur's racing formula with the lessons learnt from the beta. Lazily flooring it into hairpins and slingshotting around the barriers will no longer give players any advantage thanks to a couple of tweaks. Firstly, rough areas of circuit away from the main track slow down your car to a greater degree, while side-on collisions with the barriers also appear to take a little more speed off as well, thereby rewarding skilled use of the drift mechanic over peddle-to-the-metal mania. More substantial change comes in the setup of Blur's single-player campaign, which has pretty much done a U-turn on the ambitious plans laid out by Bizarre at the game's First Look stage this time last year.

Despite plans for a deep story in the campaign, Bizarre has now ripped out all semblance of a plot beyond the nine main boss characters that you'll race against. Each boss represents a stage in the campaign, which is then built up from seven separate events within each stage. Each event takes one of four forms - Race, Destruction, Checkpoint, or a 1-on-1 race against a boss - and players have to meet certain criteria to access more events. Examples of these criteria include building up a certain amount of Fans, which are recruited by how well you drive (i.e. how many power-ups you can land/evade, as well as the occasional secondary challenge such as driving through assigned gates), and the amount of Lights you've unlocked (awarded for your position in races and, again, secondary challenges).

There are certainly parallels here between the campaigns in Bizarre's PGR games and Blur's. Both form a sturdy building block where players can get used to the gameplay before moving onto the multiplayer, but they're also far more than a mere tutorial as well. The diversity of modes is a perfect example of this. The Destruction event takes on a different form in the single-player from its respective multiplayer version - instead of opting for the destruction derby-style format, single-player Destruction events are more like the Road Rage mode in Criterion's Burnout series. Groups of vehicles are served up for you to destroy as quickly as possible with a plentiful supply of rockets while negotiating the twists and turns of one of Blur's many circuits; the more you destroy before the event times out, the higher your score.

Checkpoint events add depth as well. As the name suggests, these events set you against the clock around a specific circuit. Extra-time and nitro power-ups are then dispensed around the track to improve your chances of beating the sadistically tight time limits. It's also events such as Checkpoint that will add appeal to the Friend Challenges and Twitter/Facebook apps that Bizarre has incorporated into the game. By updating your most recent high scores via the social network apps, you can encourage your friends to have a go at beating them. Friend Challenges, on the other hand, provide more customisation in this area, where it's possible to have added control over the design of a specific event and exactly what challenges you want friends to beat. And then there are Bizarre's 'Stickers' as well, which are essentially PS3 Trophies/Xbox 360 Achievements that have been unified for both platforms, thereby spanning the console divide across Twitter/Facebook (don't worry though, Achievement/Trophy hunters - Blur will include the usual platform specific rewards as well).

We've left the best for last, which is Blur's AI - truly the most incredulously superb element of our hands on. The debug build we played on had opened up all of the bosses for us to race against and so, of course, we chose to race against the final boss, Shannon. It wasn't just how she evaded our attacks or nailed us when we were at our most vulnerable, but the ways in which she did this. We'd be driving straight for a barge power-up with Shannon alongside - as if she were aiming for the adjacent nitrous - only for her to sheer in front of us at the last second, stealing the barge and sending us flying with it in one fell swoop. Likewise, whenever we took a separate route from her to try and catch-up a few seconds, we'd pull back onto the main track only to get rockets fired backwards at us the moment she popped back into view. Yes, the AI was fiendishly sharp, but realistically sharp as well - it wasn't without its occasional, purposefully programmed mistakes, making the whole experience decidedly more believable and immersive as a result.

Blur is, without a doubt, the most appealing gaming prospect for the summer as far as we're concerned. As an arcade driving game alone, it could be one of the most appealing prospects of the last few years. Not since Burnout 3: Takedown have we been so drawn to a high-octane, explosive racing experience like Blur. It just goes to show, well-trodden gameplay can still be superb if you execute it at the highest level - Bizarre Creations, we should never have doubted you.