
Flatout 3 pc requirements how to#
The choice of cars comes down to “fast, yet more fragile than a soap bubble,” or “slow, but slightly less fragile than a soap bubble.” With one of these cars, the player is required to pass fifteen other cars, each driven by an AI that knows how to do only one thing: run into other cars. The odds are heavily stacked against the new player from the very first race. This is where Flatout 3 falls well short. To cut to the chase: it is feasible to develop a good racing game that concentrates more on the rougher aspects of race strategy, but the game still has to be. It’s the implementation of this idea in Flatout 3 that is a disaster. Flatout 3 takes the concept of “rubbing is racing” to extremes, providing an experience that could better be described as “surviving is racing.” The underlying idea was sound: provide a racing model that puts a premium on the pushing, shoving, and outright wrecking of opponents. It’s not horrible, mind you, but it feels distinctly ‘five years ago.’Īs mentioned, the contrarian approach also has a massive effect on the game play. None of this is objectionable, although the quality of the rendering is severely below par using today’s standards. The scenery is also far more rundown and ragged looking than one would expect, except for Detroit, which is shown pretty much as-is. Gone are the posh, showroom-condition cars and the stunningly beautiful mountain tracks and complex city environments Flatout 3 presents a dystopian world populated with cars that are in an incongruously undamaged condition, yet look as though they have survived three rough years as Top Gear’s Reasonably Priced Car. The focus on being taking the opposite approach in nearly every way starts out fairly benignly, albeit somewhat jarringly. The result has not been favorable - rather than be a good game, Flatout 3 ends up as the opposite. While the name ‘Flatout’ might sound familiar to the first two games in the series, note that Flatout 3 is a completely new game developed by Team 6 Studios rather than Bugbear Entertainment, the original developer of the two preceding titles. As we will see, they have managed to do that in more ways than they may have intended. Flatout 3: Chaos & Destruction, published by Strategy First, seemingly makes it a point to be as antonymous to the more traditional console racers as possible. There is one notable exception to this model, though, in the form of a game that has taken the approach of trying to turn some of those particular weakness in the genre into being the point of the entire game. In my opinion, it doesn’t matter how pretty the cars or roads are if the quality of actual racing isn’t up to speed. Considering the effort that goes into creating nearly photo-realistic cars and racing environments, this always seemed to be a real shame to me. This ultimately leads to a racing style that is more about brute force passes than it is about any type of sophisticated, skill-driven racing. Running a close second is the cardinal rule that stipulates that I must always start at the back of the pack and get to the lead within three laps. I have always had a couple of pet peeves when it comes to console-based racing games, the first of which is the ubiquitous requirement that I “unlock” content that I have already bought and paid for.
