One of the things we noticed from the beginning is that there are a fair few options that you can choose from the main menu, including career, arcade and Xbox Live. The career mode also appeared to have a lot of missions, but we spent most of our time with the arcade mode. Arcade mode is fairly simple, all you have to do is select a vehicle (the vehicles are fictional, not fully licensed) and a race type. There were a few available race type options including point to point races and lap races.
The game doesn't have any customisation options simply because it's got a major focus on arcade gameplay. As soon as Full Auto begins though it's clear that this game is unlike anything you've ever played before. The game isn't just a racing game but also a combat title, the controls are fairly easy to grasp with the right trigger accelerating and the left trigger slowing the vehicles down.
It's all happening
All of the environments in the game are fully interactive, which means that during just one level we were smashing through crates, buildings and other objects. The one thing we realised it that it was actually possible to literally go through 99% of the objects, at one stage during a race there was a fence that blocked the vehicles and resulted in the car halting; but we're assuming this was the result of unfinished code.
One of the more unique features of Full Auto is the unwreck feature. During a race it is possible to accumulate unwreck points, and if you crash into a vehicle or another obstacle then it is possible to rewind back about ten seconds to stop this collision from happening. The feature works surprisingly well, but at times you had to use it two or three times before you could navigate around the obsctacle, which could mean that the feature becomes a bit over utilised.
Whilst the fully interactive environments are incredible, there are some drawbacks of all the clutter flying over the screen. At times there is actually too much flying around on screen, which can be extremely annoying. Some of the environmental obstacles actually block your vision and will sometimes cause you to crash; which means you will need to use the unwreck feature to restore your vehicle.
Overall though we were very impressed with how fast the game ran, even in this early build of the game their wasn't much slowdown at all and there should be no slowdown when the game hits shelves in time for launch. Full Auto is one of the only titles that we can honestly say could possibly not be done on the original Xbox, simply because their is so much happening on screen at once.
Trying to keep up is half the challenge
We also got the opportunity to play multiplayer, this was as simple as choosing a vehicle, track and weapon set; of which only assault weapons were available. The game features other opponants on the track at the same time, and the goal isn't just to finish first but also to cause as much destruction as possible, the multiplayer mode was fun and whilst we only did a straight forward race there are sure to be plenty of other multiplayer race options to spend your time with. One of the disappointments (and not really something that can be helped) is that you cannot unwreck your vehicles in multiplayer, this is disappointing but would likely make the multiplayer a little hard to keep up with if you were able to unwreck your vehicle.
Whilst Full Auto wasn't finished and we didn't get an opportunity to play the career mode it is clear that Sega are expecting big things from this game. It was surprising just how popular the game was and it becomes increasingly difficult. Sometimes it is good to play a game that doesn't take itself too seriously. Come March 2nd Full Auto is definitely a game that should be considered if you're picking up an Xbox 360.
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