Pure

Review by Slater45

Blackrock Studios presents Pure, an off road adrenaline filled ATV racer, but can this game compete with the big players of this genre?

Gamplay

Pure gives you two game modes, Quick play and world tour. World Tour starts you as a rookie at the bottom of the ladder with your goal being reaching the top. There are 10 stages throughout your career in which new races types and courses are introduced. The different race types consist of race, sprint and freestyle. Race and sprint are basic circuit races where freestyle is all about tricks and combos. The tracks are all locations from around the world and have various shortcuts and big jumps to keep the track fresh. During the career they also let you create and customize your ATV. You can change everything about you ATV; each part is changeable with a variety of vinals included. Even though there is customisation there isn't enough, with ten ATV slots available you will find yourself using the same parts later on.

Preloading is the key to every event in pure. Before hitting a jump you have to hold the LS down and the flick it up to create yourself some air so you can perform tricks. The tricks consist of easy, medium, hard and special tricks. The easy tricks are assigned to the A button, Medium tricks uses the B button and the hard tricks uses Y. Adding a direction to these buttons performs different trick which all adds up to you boost bar. As well as preloading, boost is also the key for winning on pure. Once you have fill you boost bar the top you will then have the option of a special trick. Holding LB and RB plus a direction on the left stick with execute a special trick that looks spectacular when pulled off.

After a few races and getting over the visual beauty, world tour lacked the variety to last out the whole ten stages. The courses would be original, but with only 3 race types, repetition starts to kick in. Pure is also very unforgiving. During a race you only have too crash once and you could find yourself finished no where near 1st position, I found that you have to literally get every jump perfect to win the races near the end, which for novice and veteran gamers alike becomes very frustrating.

Graphics and Sound

From the stunning backdrops to the prestige animation Pure looks and feels fantastic. The textures are one of a kind, whether it is up close and personal shots of your character hitting the dirt, or the sublime mountain views, far into the distant. Pure is a definitive showcase of the graphical power of the Xbox 360. The HDR lighting is a definite high point to the game, light shimmers of water and metal as if real, and the sun cascades through tree tops and foliage like you were actually riding an ATV through such landscapes as the Amazon and the Desert. You would never think that a racing game would showcase such graphical pretences, but Pure is a class act in all areas. The characters clothing whispers in the wind, mud splatters from the tires all over the ATV and water effects range from the splashing of murky splutters across the HUD to sprays of pure, untouched waters onto the vehicles chassis. Pure is such a great graphical piece that even some of its lacklustre and repetitive plays, you can't help but be bought in to the whole experience.

When I picked this game up I was worried that the soundtrack wasn't going to fit the feel of the game, but it actually fits perfectly, from rock to dance the music puts you in the mood for each event. The pumping bass lines of such tracks as Pendulum's, Granite really edge towards the more hardcore trance outfit, but it fits perfectly and really gets you engrossed in the race, and gears you up for some intense ATV action.

Multiplayer

Pure gives you the option of your traditional modes online, you can compete in unranked and ranked matches, but there is also a championship mode. This mode is basically a series of races, but the problem is that you can only chose one race types for all the races, so you are unable to mix the championship up. Furthermore every time I try to access the leaderboards the game freezes, making them inaccessible. Overall the online is good but there isn't enough variety to keep me coming back.

Conclusion

This game may have to breathtaking visuals, but the gameplay makes you left frustrated. The world tour is a good mode, but the lack variations between the stages leaving a lot to be desired. The multiplayer is solid but doesn't change anything from the single player experience. The graphics and sound are the biggest plus points of pure, with beautiful HDR, a solid frame rate and a fantastic soundtrack. The game would be a perfect rental game or bargain buy because there isn't enough content to keep you going for over 15 + hours.