What do you get if you cross Out Run with Burnout? You get a high octane arcade racing game called Outout, but that name is silly, MotorHEAT sounds much better! Does it burn rubber or stall at the starting line? Start your engines and find out… that means read on 🙂
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Enough with the puns! MotorHEAT is a driving game where the aim is to reach the next checkpoint before the time runs out. Your car is on auto pilot so you only need to worry about moving the car left or right on the five lanes of a never ending motorway. To help you reach the checkpoint faster you have a limited amount of boost which will turbo charge your car to insane speeds.
This is not a drive down a quiet country lane on a Sunday morning. The motorway has other traffic to hinder your progress and colliding with any vehicles will result in a Burnout style slow motion crash. While they are not as impressive as said game, it is still pretty cool and the delay will give you time to catch your breath as well as deducting 10 seconds from your time. There are a few designs of vehicles to avoid, you whizz past them so it is almost unnoticeable, but be careful of the white vehicles as they will change lanes with little warning.
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For the brave drivers, you can replenish your boost by driving close to the traffic, the closer you are the better, as you receive more boost and a handy visual notification; Bad, Good or Expert. Power up cubes appear at random intervals on the motorway to give some roadside assistance. These include boost cubes that will replenish your boost, Time cubes add vital seconds to the time and Invincibility cubes will for a limited time make you car invincible to collisions.
As you progress through your journey the game gets progressively harder. You car gains a little more speed and improved handling which does help when trying to gain some extra boost. While the surrounding scenery seems to remain the same throughout, there are some weather variations such as fog which makes it tricky to see further ahead. Later levels have you driving at night time with only your cars headlamps and the other traffic rear lights to give any indication. Boosting on the night stages is great fun, a real game of chicken if you can hold out long enough!
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The main challenge of MotorHEAT is about gaining the best score which is saved locally and more importantly on a online leaderboard. At the time of writing there were over 1,100 players on the leaderboard, I am currently ranked at a fairly respectable 416th place if you are interested. Your current ranking is visible during the game in the bottom left corner and if you can take your eyes of the road to see if you have improved it gives a great sense of achievement when you see it beat or a frustration when you are almost out of time and are close. In game rankings are a great idea, see Trials HD for proof, and it works just as well in MotorHEAT. There is only one mode in the game which is a bit of a let down, I would have loved to have seen one or two more modes like a car hitting challenge to add a bit of variety.
Graphically the game looks great, you do not get to fully appreciate the graphics while playing due to the speed. If you watch someone else play or view a video you will see the cars in good 3D detail running at a solid frame rate. You only have one choice of car, but its colour and pattern can be customised. Sound effects are used well, the engine roar sounds great and the whoosh of cars passing you is satisfying. Vocal indications are used when collecting power ups and add to the arcade feel of the game. There are 25 awards to unlock and are well thought out with a good variety of short term i.e. drive to level 10 and longer awards such as accumulating one billion score in total.
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MotorHEAT costs 240 :MSPoints: which is good value for money. You probably wont spend hours playing the game non stop but it is perfect as a quick pick up and play game. It has that one more go factor as you try to beat your score which I love in games. This is a simple but fun game you should definitely check out!
You can find out more information about the game as well as download the trial or full version of the game on the Marketplace.
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