MotorStorm Pacific Rift

We loved the first game, but does Pacific Rift offer enough new thrills to justify a return visit?

	Version PlayStation 3	Developer Evolution Studios	Publisher SCE	Genre Racing

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Another part of that brilliance is the AI, which is evil-minded to the extent of being occasionally prepared to sacrifice its podium chances in order to nudge you out of perfectly lined turns, or buffet you from behind as you're gearing up for a jump. Pixel-perfect opposition wouldn't match up to Motorstorm's utterly unscientific appeal, of course, so for every spiteful little setback inflicted by your rivals you'll see them somersault out of a half-pipe at a catastrophic velocity, or teeter drunkenly over a cliff-edge while trying to overtake. Evolution's eye for free-wheeling carnage appears undimmed.

Pacific Rift broadens the scope of each course somewhat, and encourages you to mix up your approach via a combination of ye olde persistent track damage and overlapping pathways. The former gets a quieter billing this time round (which is just as well, given its slightly underwhelming implementation in the original) but it's still an integral part of the experience, with wetter soils growing progressively more unstable under the stress till at last only the biggest or bravest will dare traverse them. The latter ensures that no contestant ever escapes a brush with the rest of the pack for long: there's nothing like that sense of panic when you exit a secluded, relatively tranquil gully and find yourself travelling at right angles to a Big Rig.

Also returning largely unchanged is the vehicle roster. The only new additions are the Monster Trucks, which marry the raw force of the Big Rigs to the all-terrain handiness of the Mudpluggers. The Racing Truck is once again a slightly cumbersome Jack-of-all-trades, while the Buggy digs in well and is mighty quick off the starting blocks. ATVs have great traction but poor endurance, Bikes are the weakest of the lot but also the most manoeuvrable, and Rally Cars are lightning-fast but have ice-cubes for tyres. Strictly speaking, some of these rides are surplus to requirements - an ATV is much the same as a Bike once you've stomped it flat - but they're worth including for visual variety at least.

Speaking of visuals, our advice is to keep pedal to metal if you want to get the best out of Evolution's engine. At pace, it's nigh-on photorealistic: light swims tenderly over garish, distorting, mud-gashed bodywork, cruder textures are lost in a welter of cinematic effects and motion blur smooths out the aliasing. But come to a halt (or pause to make use of the unwieldy in-game camera) and the compromises leap out at you: cardboard plants and swathes of angular, indistinct terrain. Music-wise we're looking at the usual metal thrashing and rap fodder, which makes the option to play your own stuff via the XMB doubly welcome.

Pacific Rift never tries to preach to anybody other than the converted, and given the original's sales figures we can hardly blame Evolution for this. The courses may be bigger (and, thanks to the new elemental categorisation, more distinct), the contents of the garage might have seen a little spit and polish, and the niggling absence of split-screen multiplayer might have been rectified, but it's still the same old Motorstorm, unabashedly messy and thus magnificent post-pub entertainment. We'll expect the next iteration to put a bit more distance between itself and its stablemates, but for now the incremental refinements and fresh tropical trappings are enough. Just about.

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