Rachel Reviews: Doritos Crash Course

Overview

Doritos Crash Course is a free XBLA title that's a lot like the TV show 'Wipeout'.  It's basically a series of reasonably short obstacle courses that run left to right with various hazards along the way.  Unlike the TV, everything in the game happens to your XBL avatar, which is great fun and it means you can get crushed by stompy things and smacked with hammers bigger than you are.

Dazed and confused!

Hitting the nail on the head!

 Gameplay

The game itself isn't difficult to play.  The controls are fairly simple to learn which makes it easy to pick up and play without any kind of difficulty.  The first few levels are more introductions to the types of obstacles and hazards than anything too challenging, though there is one later on that took me far too long to get past!  The learning curve isn't too steep and if it proves too hard then you can always skip to the end and move on to the next level.  Doing this will stop you unlocking levels so it's not advised as it will mean you won't be able to go back and do them individually to get a Gold medal.

In one level you have to swing on a rope over a moving walkway, jump off onto a moving platform, and then jump off that onto another rope.  It does require a fair degree of good timing in order to do it, but that's true of the rest of the levels.

I'm Tarzan!

Graphics

The graphics are kind of basic while still looking good.  Taking a cue from the avatars, the game has a kind of cartoon-y feel to it with bright colours and amusing avatar animations.  It's always obvious as to what does what in the game.  The ropes are distinguishable from the chains because the move and are bright yellow whereas the chains are silver kind of grey.  The two types of moving walk way, one fast and one slow, are very different in colour so there should be no surprises there either.

Achievements

There aren't many achievements and they're only worth 200 gamer score in total, but they are more than just a few token achievements.  Getting Gold in all the levels will take time and effort.  It is possible to get some just by play any level without worrying about time so they aren't all hard to get either.

Gripes

Yeah, I have some gripes with it.  One of the levels (level 4 in Japan) is insanely hard.  There's an achievement for doing it in 1:40 or less, which seems impossible, but I'll still keep trying to get it.  Whether I actually do it or not remains to be seen, but it'll probably be worth it, I hope.

There is no level editor.  I know this is a free game but I feel they missed out on something here.  There levels are fun enough to provide replay value on their own but having levels made by friends would have been a great addition.  Halo and Trials Evolution are two examples of where this works really well.

Overall

It's not the most sophisticated of games and there are certainly better games out there.  That said, it is free so you don't lose anything getting it.  If you don't like it you can just delete it.  I, however, do like it and I'll definitely be keeping it.  There's a certain charm to seeing your avatar being smacked into the screen or get squashed that never gets old, except after the tenth time in the same place or something.  If it wasn't free I probably wouldn't be fussed about it, but as it is free I definitely think it's worth trying out.  And, hey, winning is always run!

Winner!

(images taken from the XBL marketplace page)