CRITERION GAMES

WAITING GAME

I think you guys are an amazing development team and can't wait until Burnout 5. Can you let me know around what time it will be coming out? I'm planning to make this my first PS3 game and I don't want to buy the console in December and have to wait until March to buy a game.

Sbella

Dear Mr "SBella",

Thanks for mailing.

Burnout 5 is scheduled for release in Spring 2007 for Sony Playstation 3 and Microsoft Xbox 360.

The Burnout Team


I WANT TO HELP

I'm a big fan of the Burnout series, and have been playing since Takedown. I still play Takedown to this day, but I find myself playing it more than I play Revenge. I am greatly anticipating Burnout 5, but have a few possible suggestions.

A comment was recently made with Burnout 5 that says something along the lines of making the game fun is more important than just making it realistic. However I feel a lot of the "fun" in the crashing on the game was removed in Revenge. Some improvements were made, and I can't wait to see my cars go up in 80 pieces on Burnout 5, but when my car wrecks on Revenge, its not nearly as interesting. It seems like it was focused more on showing the sense of realism and speed than fun crashes. Please replay a Race or Road rage on Takedown and take down notes, no need breaking something that was already fixed.

I have a small beef about Crashbreakers in races and road rage in general—they seem fine in multiplayer but kind of ruin replayability of single player races. No matter how good you get, you can always hit that car on the other side of the road with a force 1 Crashbreaker. The "timing" of it is way too easy when you're given impact time. In multiplayer it seems to have done justice however.

What happened to our cars? The cars selection in Takedown seemed like a much better selection and the AI seemed to pick a better selection of cars to compete against yourself, same with Legends. In fact, I most enjoyed the selection in Legends. Revenge is one huge section of similar looking vehicles until you get to the cars that top out at 209.

I'm really looking forward to the city in Burnout 5, but can we also have a quick play format that was lost in Revenge as well. I'm afraid of having to drive across a city just to start an event I already completed. The single player menu on Takedown alone is reason enough for me to play it over Revenge. I often spend 2-3 minutes digging through the ranks and areas looking for a certain map to play on, just to find out that I am limited to a certain car. You have a menu in multiplayer, why cant you make one for single player. It's not all about the world tour, or in Burnout 5's case, it won't be all about the city. If I want to sit down and do a single race before class, the menu makes a difference.

Maybe this is partial rant, but I want to help.

Thanks for listening.

~nick

Dear Nick,

Thanks for mailing.

In answer to some of your questions:

– We are the guys who made Takedown so we played it quite a bit already. The only differences in crashing between B3 and B4 were technical ones—stuff like deformation looks cooler. They were just as fun.

– Crashbreaker Race was just something we put in because we wanted to and we could.

– Who said they were your cars? We actually like all of the cars in all of the games we made.

– Single Player was something we were planning to do on Revenge but it just didn't make it into the final game. I would love to be able to explain to you everything exciting about B5 but we just can't as it's just not an appropriate time (note to audience – please don't email about B5!)

The Burnout Team


DRIFT JUMPING...AGAIN

I have been playing online recently and on the track Angel Valley Reverse, at the start where you go through the Sewers, I did a drift jump at the end of the sewers and I was going 290+ mph which I think is crazy....I don't have a clue how I did this, but do you know any good points in getting speeds like this? I am ranked in the top 100 and if I want to compete with the top 10 I need to figure out how to do this.

I would just also like to say good luck with Burnout 5 and I hope it will be as good and as addictive as Revenge.

Thanks,
Martin

Thanks for mailing and for also using what we hope is your real name. It does make a refreshing change and greatly increases the chance of your email being answered.

– I think you are talking about the "controversial" topic of drift jumping. Regular readers will no doubt agree that this has been covered enough already.

– Thanks. We're big fans of the movie "The Abyss" so we know that 'luck is NOT a factor.'

The Burnout Team


LIFE IS SO UNFAIR

Hi I would like to say how cool Burnout Revenge is, but I would like to ask a question—when are you going to sort it out so when you're playing live that your ranking doesn't go back up when Xbox freezes?

David

Dear David,

Originally it was planned that whenever your Xbox freezes you instantly becoming ranked number one in the world. Can you believe we had to change that?!!

The Burnout Team


LIFE IS SO UNFAIR: PART II

Dear Criterion Studios,

You probably wouldn't do this, but please can I get a BLACK copy for free? It's a stupid question but I'm letting you know the game's excellent from reviews and trailers—I'm just icthing to get it every time. I can't wait to get paid by my father just to get it.

YOUR BEGGING FAN,
Kyle Johnson

Dear Kyle,

Thanks for writing in and begging from us.

However, we make our living from selling our work for your gaming pleasure.

So sorry, we won't be sending you a free one. BLACK is a great game and well worth saving up for.

The Burnout Team