To be sure, there's a ton of racing games available on the Xbox. Off-road, rally car, arcade-style, simulation, futuristic racers are all revved up and motoring on the Xbox. Missing from the racing ranks however, has been an ATV racing title. But ATV: Quad Power Racing 2 (QPR2) has finally filled that racing niche.
QPR2 is a down-and-dirty all-terrain vehicle racer incorporating a good racing challenge with some questionable content that tries to get extreme in a Tony Hawk's Pro Skater (THPS) kind of way. Yes, there are real racers like Dana Creech, Tim Farr, and Kory Ellis, but quite honestly, if you're like me, I've never heard of these people and their inclusion in QPR2 makes no difference to me at all, the total opposite of how I feel about the real skaters (with a million times more recognition level) shredding it up in THPS. Some people may like that touch of realism, but most won't care and instead will be more interested in QPR2 if it's any good as a racing game.
The most questionable part of QPR2 is the very aggressive and violent aspect of racing around the many QPR2's courses. While QPR2's racing is easily one of the game's stronger points, I don't see why the developers felt the need to damper the ATVing fun by allowing you to literally kick your opponents off their ATVs, thereby gaining an advantage. Of course, they can reciprocate, and that can really be infuriating, particularly in the game's more difficult levels where the opposing drivers get more than a little kick-happy with your ATV-driving butt. Having to worry about getting pummeled off your vehicle while in the midst of intense racing kills some of the enjoyment of the excellent and challenging races that make up QPR2. I know extreme sports games are popular, but the violence in QPR2 takes extreme racing to the extreme, not to mention setting a horrible example of recklessness on vehicles not exactly known for their utmost safety to begin with. QPR2 would be a much better game without the nastiness.
Despite that, QPR2 has a bunch of goodies in its deep treads. To start, the game looks great, with polished graphics all around. The drivers, bikes, and track environments all are rendered with a quality touch. QPR2's tracks are smartly laid out with plenty of varied racing areas that include mud-covered swamplands, desert dunes, and snowcapped mountains. Plenty of hill jumping, power-sliding, and plain old speed will be required to get through QPR2's entertaining racing levels. You'll have only a few standard ATVs available when you first start playing, but by winning races you can open up more powerful ATVs, which really are necessary as you get deeper into the recesses of QPR2, considering that QPR2 packs a powerful challenge from the A.I.-controlled racers in Career mode.
Now, I'm all for squaring off against tough competition. It's not any fun when it's easy to win all the time. Through all of QPR2's modes, including the four-player multiplayer races, you'll have some sweaty-palm inducing competition. But QPR2 goes way overboard in the Challenge mode. In Challenge mode, the goal is to complete obstacle-filled courses within a certain time limit. There are two types of challenges: ground challenges, which are hard but eventually manageable, and tower challenges. Let me tell you something about these damned tower challenges. There have been very few game experiences for me in my 23 years of gaming that have been as downright impossible and utterly frustrating as QPR2's tower challenges.
I'd like to know who the sick puppy was that came up with these courses. They require some unbelievably difficult driving up large towers of stacked platforms and cylinders. Not only do you have to go up, up, and even further up these dizzying heights, many of the platforms and cylinders and just big enough for your ATV to fit on. Even the slightest miscalculation on braking and turning on this psychotic obstacle arena, and you're going for a plunge into the surrounding pool many, many, many feet below. After about 100 tries I had just barely got the hang of the first tower challenge before I humbly surrendered to the fruitless endeavor of completing any of the tower challenges.
Fortunately, among the many modes of QPR2 are the Freestyle and ATV Academy, which not only let you get used to the basic controls and racing techniques used in the Career and multiplayer modes, but you get to learn QPR2's great trick system, including the preloading needed to pull off the tricks. And mastering these tricks like the superman, surfer flips, and Yogi isn't just for bragging rights, either. Pulling off tricks during races builds up your rider's boost meter, which when used throws the ATV into a temporary turbo-boost zone that can mean the difference between a first or last-place finish.
The soundtrack has some good hard-rocking tunage from the likes of the Rollins Band and even some racetrack-thrashing Godsmack. But the music becomes way too repetitive during long ATV racing sessions because there's only a measly seven songs on the soundtrack, coming nowhere a near an acceptable amount. Making musical matters worse it that the Xbox's custom soundtrack feature can't even be used, so you can't listen to your own favorite driving tunes to fill the game's woeful void.
Despite the insanely difficult and nearly impossible Challenge mode and the sometimes-unfair violent behavior on the part of the A.I.-controlled racers, a good visual presentation, great trick system and tough races make ATV: Quad Power Racing 2 a good addition to the Xbox racing library. Any Xboxers looking for a change-of-pace racer that doesn't involve cars or trucks of any kind may want to give it an off-road go with QPR2.
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