I have spent more than my fair share of money fixing my damn car in the original Juiced title, so much in fact that when I was presented with a chance to see a demo of the new addition to the Juiced franchise I almost passed on it. After the demo, I felt better about the title, and better about being a tuner poser.

But we'll talk about that another time. Right now I want to talk about THQ's new addition to the race driving genre Juiced 2: Hot Import Nights.

I think that I am one of those rare people that [for the most part] enjoyed the first Juiced title when it came out. I love racing games. I love them even more when the cars retain damage over time. I love being able to race other drivers from across the globe in real-time, and I love being able to modify my in-game vehicle as I choose as I have no real money to do so in the real world. With all that said, Juiced the first really should have been an out of the park hit for me, but it wasn't.

As I said earlier, the first game was plagued by keeping many drivers from progressing very far. You had to earn money by winning races in order to buy better cars and compete in different circuits, but if you took too much damage during a race you had to spend that money on fixing your car so you could continue racing at all, let along purchase a new vehicle. This lead to a vicious circle which ultimately lead to my giving the game away and going back to Turismo. At least there I could progress up the racing chain as it were, but for me it wasn't as fun as Juiced the first originally was in the beginning of my gameplay. After being treated to this demo of Juiced the second by licensing manager [and drift master extrordinaire] Nick Clarkson, I think that frustrating loop has been addressed.

Gone is the need to repair your car after a race. Gone is the race buy-in. In HIN you make money only to purchase new cars, or mod your existing one... and that's the way I like it. A new addition that I think will add to the gameplay is the ability to bet on races in order to make money to better your vehicle or use towards the purchase of a new set of wheels. What's even better is that you can bet on races that you aren't even driving in... on or offline. So if your tuner and or turning skills suck, but on a surething online. If things aren't quite going your way, you can change your bet in the middle of the race and hope to recoup some of your losses. And do I have to mention the ability to slap some true to life aftermarket parts on your psuedo ride is kinda pimp? I don't? Didn't think I had to.

Labels: E3, Hands-On-Demo, Juiced2, Ninjasistah, Videogames