(The rating represents my enjoyment I had with this game and nothing else) Don't expect a fluid gameplay in your first run like you see in the trailer. I was sometimes stuck, didn't know what to do, considered a walkthrough and sometimes I felt forced to beat/kill the enemies to progress though the game is clearly designed as a run only game. The game was only fun when the pace was fast and the flow perfect. It was sometimes like that, but the moments I had to look for the next step or looking up a walkthrough, because of having no idea what to do, happened to often and tainted the experience for me. I recently gave the game another shot and came to the conclusion that if you remove the beautiful music and art design there isn't much left that was worth my time. Playing it after a year I still needed help. I really wish there would be more elements marked red, so I would be able to just run while always knowing where to go. To get the experience I expect I either need to replay the levels several times or watch someone playing it before I do so. I'm not here to hate this game, I just want to represent the game from a different perspective and maybe even informing others who might have similar preferences then I do. I'm happy for everyone who doesn't have my issues or has different preferences so he sees the game in a different light. As long as there is at least one person who had a great experience playing it, the game has a right to exist.
While the first game was hard FlatOut 2 is beyond easy & hard. It is arbitrary, luck decides if you win or not and you as the player have little influence on that. There are two main issues [b]The engine/the car behavior[/b] You cannot predict how your car will react during a jump or hitting an obstacle. Sometimes it runs smoothly, sometimes you will lose your position or advantage. Therefore there is little space in getting better or master the game, because you don't get proper feedback which action benefits you and which one will be punished. You will find at the bottom a video I've done about two stunts. The only thing I do is pressing throttle without pausing it, so there is no room for variation. I do this in both stunts. Two exact same actions from the player result in different outcomings. [b]The AI/your opponents[/b] Some of them are trolls, not interested in winning the race just ramming other cars and putting themselves at the tail end while giving you a hard time. The other extreme are the flawless ones, usually using one of the higher level cars which you have to unlock first. Catching up with them happens rarely. They usually drive clean and boost forwards if you are getting close. Starting at the last position puts you in huge disadvantage against those. The other thing is that the AI adapts to you. Are you driving faster or have you upgraded your car? They get better as well, so the difficulty seems to stay stable. At least to a certain point. Buying a new car with much better values makes the races easier, but not as much as I expected. [b]Some small annoyances[/b] -The starting position varies, but most times I got the last place or something near that. -Later in the game you may have to repeat races a couple times to collect the amount of money to buy a car you've just unlocked. Winning all level 1 races doesn't guarantee you having enough money for a Level 2 car. -Strangely a Level 1 car isn't necessary good enough to compete in Level 1 races. I once had to grind for a better one and repeated the races. -NPCs get fixed cars from the start of a class and some of them get ones from a higher tier. It would be fairer if everyone would use a car from the same level. All in all: Driving good doesn't get rewarded, you need a certain amount of luck. Both, losses and victories, felt cheap and latter one never satisfied me. I was just relieved to be over the current race. Now the most important point: Does this all make the game unenjoyable? It depends. Are you looking for a serious racing game? Is anything but 1st place not an option to you? Then skip this one. It started pretty easy and was fun, but the further I got into the game the more the races turned into bitter and teeth-gnashing hours of retries which felt more like playing roulette and waiting until the ball hits your number. If you don't care about the mentioned issues, because just beating the game is enough for you or you just want to have a bit random wanky car physics fun, you might wanna try it. At least it won't hurt as long as you don't take it too seriously and bite your teeth into it. Video: https://youtu.be/y9nAsEfCIX8 PS: Ignore the stars. I'm not a fan of scores, because they don't give useful information to others. Since you have to rate the game to submit a review the stars represent my "enjoyment".
