NASCAR 08

6.5
Average

Gameplay	5.0	"The gameplay can be frustrating"
Graphics	7.0
Sound	7.0
Value	7.5

By Daniel Needham

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While it’s not everyone’s cup of tea, you can’t dispute the fact that NASCAR is insanely popular in the United States. Whether it’s the speed, the glory or the promo girls, the sport manages to captivate scores of fans, and with NASCAR 08 you too have the chance to at least attain one of the aforementioned goals.

NASCAR 08 features a large number of tracks and most drivers on the tour, and allows you to race a full, half, short, or custom season in the Nextel, National, or Craftsman truck series. You can also race a season in the Car of Tomorrow, but it’s just a single season, no ongoing career in the above modes.

Online too much of the time you’ll find yourself being an observer, rather than an active participant due to the very sensitive crash detection, causing the caution flag to always come out. Once you get past this though, there is a nice amount of options and settings for online play, with you being able to tinker with tracks, lap amounts and opponents.

As well as online gameplay being frustrating, the play within the rest of the title is also hair-shredding at times. Handling on your car feels loose, which allows you to lose control of your car far too easily. This is only aggravated by aggressive A.I. once played on any advanced difficulty levels. At times you’ll think you’re back at the local fair as it’s reduced to a battle of bumper cars, as the A.I looks to take you out.

One of first things NASCAR game fans will notice when you hit the track is the huge graphics upgrade. It's not quite Forza, but it's a big leap over what fans of the series have gotten used to. Something like being able to see more of the track more clearly is a godsend to races, as it’s now much easier to find turns approaching you in the distance, whereas in the past, it could take a while to get used to the individual circuits.

Couple this with a solid frame rate, and a decent in-game sound package featuring great effects, such as screeches, crashes and crowd noise, as well as all the additional ESPN audio content like podcasts, and NASCAR holds its own in the next-gen world.

Questionable gameplay decisions, quirky AI, and lacklustre online play really dog NASCAR 08 from being up there with the premier racing titles on the 360, but with some improvement - like some of EA’s other franchises have had since starting next-gen - then it too might find itself one day in the winner’s circle on pit-lane.

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