Anyone who has ever been in a real car, going really fast, knows the thrill of gut-wrenching speed. Your insides crawl their way up to the back of your throat, your adrenal gland zips into overdrive, and you start buzzing from the natural high. I've been reviewing videogames for a lot longer than is probably healthy, and I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of games that have produced any kind of reaction even remotely comparable. One of them was R360 (the arcade version of Afterburner that physically tipped you upside down and made you want to hurl), but I think MC2 is the first PS2 game to really get my heart racing. If you really get into this, your adrenal gland will start juicing out its stuff so much that you'll actually feel that buzz. How is this possible? Well, it's mainly due to the enormous amount of pressure the game places on you. You progress only if you take first place in each race, y'see, and every challenge you face is almost overwhelmingly sizeable. On top of this, the races all take place in cities as open and intricate as those in GTA, so you feel the thrill from not only trying to win but also discovering new routes and clever techniques to outsmart the other racers. The icing on the cake is the fact that your opponents give an impression of awareness that's downright spooky. They mess up in believable ways, and even cop an attitude with you if you cause them problems. It makes for a tremendously competitive environment. Races can take up to seven minutes to complete (this may not sound like much, but it's actually pretty long when you're not just going 'round and 'round a boring racetrack), and the balance of power can shift significantly based on who makes the right moves at the right time. Every-thing happens so quickly, you really get the feeling that messing up will be downright disastrous.
Now, for some, the pressure may prove too much. I know some people who'd suggest that MC2 is simply "too hard"--but it's not. In most racing games, if you screw up, you keep repeating yourself because the options for changing tactics are so limited. In MC2. you can completely change the way you race, to the point where you can totally alter the route you take to meet your objectives.
With all of this excitement, and the huge number of options and extras available to you, I have to say that MC2 is probably the best new racing game to come out in a long, long time. There's an awful lot for you to work through in terms of gameplay, and the difficulty will make you feel like you're getting your money's worth.
