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Don't Believe The (bad) Hype

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: August 25, 2007
Author: Amazon User

Wipeout Fusion has been hailed as the game that killed the Wipeout franchise. Before Fusion, Wipeout 3 killed the Wipeout franchise. Before 3, there was criticism by the hardcore race gamers of Wipeout XL. If you play each game in order, you see that the series has evolved from a slick, mean physics simulation to an arcade game. For that reason, and not having the Design Republic's neo-deco billboards floating around the tracks, this game got flushed by the fans.

Too bad.

Fusion is loaded with beautiful tracks, with corkscrews, loop-de-loops, jumps, high-dives, you name it. Basically all the best parts of a rollercoaster, only armed with weapons. In league mode, you can make modifications to your vehicle's stats with your winnings- a nice touch if you're fond of a certain craft. And mercifully, the learning curve is more gentle. You won't get to the fourth track and find back to back right angle turns waiting for you.

Part of the joy of a racing videogame for me is a believable feeling of speed.. I like a straightaway or a sheer corkscrew drop at 500 mph now and again. This game delivers.

At the end of the day it's great entertainment for under 10$.

Get some asprin before you play!

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 2 / 2
Date: July 10, 2005
Author: Amazon User

Great game, with awesome graphics. But don't play on a big screen T.V. for to long without any asprin. You are going really fast, around 100-300 MPH, or more. It takes a while to unlock the other tracks, and there are a lot of weapons that you and your opponents can use.

Killer racing game

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: May 12, 2005
Author: Amazon User

While I won't say this the best Wipeout game ever made I will say it's very, VERY close to being the one. This game will definitely have you on the edge of your seat. For those of you not familiar with the franchise I'll just say a few things. GET FAMILAR! The Wipeout game series is all about high octane arcade racing. You are behind the controls of an anti-gravity rocket speeding across various tracks all the while not only trying to outrun your opponents but also outgun them. Weapons are added to the gameplay to help slow down your opponents or knock them out of the race (and get you out in turn). Put all this together and you have the best sci-fi racing franchise ever.

Now to what makes Wipeout Fusion different from the others. First off it's on the PS2 and with that comes greatly improved graphics and processor power to make the vehicles go fast. Really fast. While the previous games had great graphics and you indeed went really fast the PS2 puts a little edge on all that.

There are a ton of courses compared to the others. While many of the courses are the same track in reverse or with a few detoured changes it's enough to make the difference. A new feature on Fusion is the ability to tweak your vehicle. Make it stronger, faster, more maneuverable. And with those changes the ship actually starts to look different. Nice touch.

Wipeout has always been known for killer electronic dance music soundtracks and this is no exception. You get some nice mixes of songs from Orbital, Future Sound of London, Luke Slater, Plump DJ's and more. You get a ton of them too. Something like 16-18 songs, which is a lot more than any previous game. The music isn't as eclectic as Wipeout 2, but fits perfectly for a driving game (probably my fave Wipeout soundtrack aside from Wipeout 3).

There are some differences I noticed in gameplay. You take damage a little more than normal now. Little scrapes on the sides of the road cause damage when before not so much. There is no instant replay like on Wipeout 3, which is a shame considering the sweet graphics. The AI is a bit deeper on this one, with actual personalities coming from the opposing drivers. You get to know their names and they easily enough become your nemesis when they keep you from winning.

It's not the best Wipeout game you can have. It could have been if they made some adjustments (like instant replay) and took a few more of the best the other games had. As it is you should definitely pick it up. Especially at the prices you can get for it now. If you like arcade racing of any kind you will love Wipeout 3

fine addition to Wipeout franchise

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 1 / 2
Date: April 07, 2005
Author: Amazon User

i have to preface this by saying i have a newer PS2 and i have finished the first 10 AG races though i am still less than 30% done with the game they say. first i would like to respond to all the "hugely disappointed" wipeout fans out there. please stop "sighing" and whining. i ordered this game and then read the bad reviews here and i was torn up about the game being junk but when i got in it turns out that Wipeout Fusion is still SONY's franchise player so take heart fans.
i read complaints about the MUSIC not being done by the chemical bros. i guess that "fan" didn't find much worthy about the original Wipeout. the music is great if you go in for this kind of music (btw, the chem bros are way overrated. yeah, the first track on the remix disk "drugstore cowboy" is good but the rest of it is wack). the music could have been a a bit more positive. what's Cold Storage up to these days?
As far as SPEED goes i think there is plenty of it though there could be more if the tracks weren't so narrow. there are a number of "jaw dropping" moments out there and some really nice touches with absent guard rails and stuff. very challenging TRACKS with lots of diversity. if you slam into a wall you might pop through and need to be rescued but with some practice you will acquire the necessary skill to race properly without training wheels so keep trying. the AI is good and you are never all alone.
I agree, though, that ship physics have taken a hit. you must use air brakes constantly to make the thing turn at all (i've raced three different ships all loaded) and the tracks are so narrow that the days of carving turns in your auricom are gone and now its asimply a matter of staying off the walls as much as possible. i prefer the old style wall-bump speed penalty versus the new damage infliction. plus, that scraping along the side in wipeout xl was awesome and that just spells damage in Fusion.
the absence of the DESIGNER'S REPUBLIC team does suck. the dopey dime a dozen characters in DR's stead bring the game down. i wish someone would go back to the original wipeout and realize that the future world in all its coolness and graphic design and seriousness as a legitimate racing sport was a huge part of the love for this game and has disappeared since. Lets leave the goofy kid's stuff to the 99% of the rest of the cookie cutter time waster games out there. sony fumbled on that one.
IN CONCLUSION Bam did a respectable job and the game is definitley a keeper. i hope we see more editions only let's get back to the roots of the thing - staying off the walls while carving turns and cornering in different ships. message to SONY: RECOGNIZE.
P.S. i am a fan of the series so you may want to take off a star for that. if you are curious though you should definitely pick up the earlier wipeouts. The original PS1 Wipeout still can't be beat.

Wipeout Fusion is great!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: July 26, 2004
Author: Amazon User

Wipeout Fusion is a high-speed futuristic racing game. There are many game modes, like AG league, Zone, and Challenge. AG league is the real part of the game. The first leagues are slow and easy, but the last few leagues are very difficult. The other racers will try to blast you at every turn. In Zone mode, you try to survive on the track for as long as possible, while the ship gets faster and faster and faster. It is very exciting. The graphics are good, and the music is perfect. Get this game if you want a great racing game!

The naked truth about Wipeout Fusion

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 4 / 4
Date: July 08, 2004
Author: Amazon User

Unfortunately I am one of those Wipeout `fans' who have played and completed all of the various incarnations. Only very recently did I get my hands on a PS2 and a copy of wipeout fusion. To be honest, I thought it was a bit strange that the game moved forward so much in certain areas but lost so many of the features that define the wipeout experience.

Firstly I would like to say that I find both the graphics and the track design (there are a couple of minor exceptions outlined below) absolutely excellent. The attraction of the Wipeout series for myself and the majority of the fan-base was really the sense of speed, the `coolness' factor and also the sheer satisfaction of linking up a couple of good corners by mastering the authentic feeling aircraft model. It was these things that kept you playing.

The speed issue is hard to understand. Wipeout fusion is just really slow compared with the upper leagues of the previous games. In addition to a new aircraft model that feels somehow synthetic and not really based on physics (sometime when cornering with the airbrake there is a conspicuous lack of momentum or something) the lack of speed puts an end to that heart-in-the-mouth feeling you got in fast sections in the other games. It is also probably the case that the sudden deceleration from hitting the side of the track in the earlier games was part of the addictiveness and thrill of getting it right and going fast. Additionally, there is no longer that drag sound as you air-brake which reinforces the sense of current speed and momentum and also deceleration - which removes a fraction of your immersion.

The aircraft model no longer lets you take a tight corner from a bad angle, slowly. In XL/ 2097 if you messed up your approach you could still airbrake like mad and avoid colliding with the side of the track - the penalty some speed, but not as significant as hitting the side of the track. Which is the other strange thing, given you cannot make corners at absurd angles anymore, you tend to hit the side of the track very often which doesn't really do much to slow you down. The penalty is shield energy which is not really the most attractive aspect of Fusion.

The weapons are bizarrely over-powerful and now you can race a perfect race and still come last due to luck alone. The most irritating are those that stop the player's craft entirely. The previous games would certainly not have put weapons over speed. The leagues are now a matter of trial and error and you get the impression that skill had a smaller part to play than probability. You are no longer awarded for you ability to fly the craft. A minor gripe is that pitting (which you have to do no matter how good you are) takes too long since you are forced to slow down.

The lack of the coolness factor is a bit inexplicable. The underground techno music of the previous games that lends a dark and industrial feel is gone and replaced with somewhat tacky trance music which is a bit weak. The menu music is optimistic like that of a football game instead of dark and gritty - a cue to get wired. The Designer's Republic did good work on the other games and the Fusion interface seems shallow and sterile by comparison. The 3d character designs look infantile next to the 2d anime-chic of the first game.

The other problem is that the speed/difficulty issue is gone. Leagues are not noticeably faster and even when they actually are, the effect of speed in determining difficulty is masked by the heavy bias of weapons and shields and pitting etc. Other minor issues are annoying `open' areas that have you lost in a cave unable to see due to over-opaque particle effects. There is also an odd tendency for the aircraft model to change when you are exiting one of the open areas in such a way that you feel pulled toward the exit - or quite often a wall demarking the exit. The problem is, that the faults tend not to feel deliberate since there are clearly undesirable faults such as fairly bad slow-down. Also, I cannot be the first to mention the difference in handling of the craft between regular and widescreen display settings.

The overall impression is that the game has not been tested thoroughly and/or it has paid little notice of the fundamentals that made previous incarnations so great. I still load up the other games for a blast - just single arcade races around one of my favourite tracks - despite the improved graphics and tracks, I have no desire to do so with fusion which is a great pity. Nevertheless I pray that the series will find its feet and continue.

A hugely disappointed wipeout fanatic and software developer.

Hmmm ... not the best, no, but ...

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: April 30, 2004
Author: Amazon User

... there's something about it that has made me dump just about 150 hours of play time into it (according to the clock on my first saved game, and not including others). Fusion is odd because, although it is not the best of the series, and although it feels slightly disjointed and out of place in the franchise, it still affords me an immense amount of fun, as evidenced by the hours I've wracked up. I finished and unlocked everything easily enough, within a couple casual gaming months of purchase, yet I still enjoy turning the game on about once a week - sometimes when I'm waiting for friends, to go out, or just chilling out with a drink and clearing my head. The game is FUN.

Visually, it's not the best looking game on the PS2, nor is is the best designed of the WipeOut series, although it certainly has its moments. A few of the locations seem uninspired, but the majority of them are quite detailed, challenging, and just fun to race through. While the courses themselves may seem twisty and winding to a fault, they are in fact very intuitively designed and compliment the racing experience nicely, once you've gained some mastery of the controls. Tracks are wide in Fusion, much wider than in any previous games. There are narrow areas, but they are reserved for tunnels and cut-aways and such. Course diverge and converge regularly, and many of them have multiple routes at several points. Each location has a short, medium, and long course, and sometimes they overlap, which adds a new dimesnion of difficulty as the racer must reorient himself - but as the shorter ones can sometimes be as deadly as the longer ones, these are not so much tags of difficulty as merely separators.

Weaponry in the game is the biggest change - there are many new weapons and some of them are very, very cool. Teams now have unique super-weapons, gained via "license" through a series of challenges, and these are of course spectacular. Things like the Orbital Laser (a beam of light that comes down in a neat little clip and blows up any one competitor), Seismic Field (I think of it as a small, self-contained black hole that rumbles down the track and causes much mayhem), and Power Swarm (the coolest - little sentry drones that flight out and devastate whoever is nearest) are genuinely thrilling to unleash against competitors.

As you progress through the game, ships can be modified and upgraded - these upgrades represent four speed classes - although it is possible to have a very fast ship in favor of other essentials like shield power or handling. This aspect of the game holds promise but really seems to be rather pointless in this incarnation, as the teams themselves are predisposed to be more or less powerful, already.

The music in Fusion is not as catchy as in previous titles, though there are a few very good tracks here and there, and the sound effects are done in Dolby Pro Logic II surround, which is incredible and more than compensates for the music (in fact I play with the music off and turn on my own collections instead, with just the SFX coming from the game).

It isn't too hard (as a veteran of the series, and of future-racing in general, it afforded me a good amount of difficulty for several days, which I view as a good thing) nor is it too easy, even for an experienced player. One of the key points of all the WipeOut games, of any future-racer, is mastering the controls. Newcomers should be advised that it isn't easy - but that is part of the genre as a whole, not a flaw in the game design. In fact, the physics in Fusion actually make the game much more player-friendly than the previous titles of the series. Computer AI is a blast, too. The other racers will just as often blow themselves up as they will you - it's not 15 to 1 here; it's every pilot for themselves.

Overall, the wide range of customizations available to the ships, and the variety of courses (in seven locations with three parts each, both going forward and in "reverse" - equals to about 42 total racing experiences, plus one other limited location for a total of 45) and weaponry makes for a diverse and surprisingly deep, long lasting and satisfying gaming experience. This game is just what it should be, and no more: fun, easy to pick up and play, fast, and frantic. You need not think too much or otherwise engage your mind. Unfortunately, although it's primed for it, the game lacks a multiplayer capability, which would have truly set it apart, and only offers a two player mode. Now that console multiplayer is more common, we can hope the next game of the series will have it.

WHY PSYGNOSIS WHY!?!?!?!?!?

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: March 02, 2004
Author: Amazon User

why did you do this to us. BAM Enterainment you are horrible at recreating sequels to games. The whole wipeout series is a wonderful anti-gravity racing simulation experience. Wipeout started it all when talking about extreme racing. This game is ok......def not what i expected. I expected the same hard beats in (like wipeout 3's under the influence by the chemical brothers) but instead i get alot of weak music except maybe 5 of them and im a music producer. the graphics are pretty swell in this game the only probs are the glitches, the break control, and the audio as far as sfx. the game has major issues of controlling speed...meaning that when tryin to take a turn the game glitches and sends you flying off track, but this was not an issue in other wipeout games. The sfx in this game were rushed........most of the sounds you can't even hear unless you turn off the music which i don't mind doing anyway cuz the music sucks but they need to improve them. most of the sounds sound a lil low tech for the game more like atari versus wipeout 3 totally blew me the heck away with the amazing sounds, the quality, and the variety of different whereas wipout fusion doesn not have any of the above.
Word of advice if you love the series and don't want to be dissppointed take my advice and RENT this game or wait till the price drops. BAM you are horrible and Psygnosis you are too for letting BAM do this and selling out and i hope you reconsider making another sequel but way better with top of the line music, interfaces, controlls, everything.

Slightly above average racer

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: July 17, 2003
Author: Amazon User

This game is pretty decent. It starts off slow but as you upgrade the ships the game speed picks up. Each ship from the different teams acts and reacts differently to certain situations so you will have to adjust. The techno music in the game is not for everyone but you can skip tracks you don't like or cut all of them out all together. The graphics are good but not great. Having S-video hookup makes the graphics look great. My biggest complaint has to come with the load times. Can get a bit long winded and eventually becomes a pain. Also time trial should be opened at the beginning of the game. Things become frustrating when you run a course in tourny mode for the first time and you have absolutely no clue to where your going. On another note thats not always a bad thing because getting lost helps find secret short cuts. The AI gets tough as the game progress, no big suprise there. All the other extras in the game are double edged because as you open super weapons you and the AI can use them. The AI is a good shot considering the speed and the constant cornering throughout the game.

Wipeout is fun to play but it has its flaws. Another game becoming rare but the price has not gone down since its release. It is worth buying but not at full retail pricing. If you can get it used or at discount pricing go for it. I was lucky to find it cheap and for what I paid I'm happy.

Wipeout Fusion

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: April 18, 2003
Author: Amazon User

An excellent introduction to the game giving you a good idea of what it is going to be about, as soon as you start playing you will be able to pick up the controls quite easily, but the same cannot be said about the handling of the crafts. They take some skill to master but the crafts cover all sorts of gamers from amatuers to pros without being to difficuilt straight away for starters.

Graphics are highly impressive with some very nice visual touches, presentation is slick and its overall playability will keep drawing you in time after time. A good soundtrack accompanies the game very well, if you are looking for a polished, futuristic racing game then this will be ideal for you.

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