i have the game, it is incredibally the best racing/crashing game the world could yet posssibly obtain. i like the part about the real world relation between burnout and real life. its so goddamn accurate. i also like how burnout is a world to explore, unlike other racing games you can go everywhere you see. the thing i hate most about a game is that you see a place where you want to go but the game isnt designed to let you go there.

I hate to say it, but I really didn't like the demo.  One of the things I liked best about Burnout was the ability to play it for 10 or 20 minutes if I wanted to and then get out.  I liked the ability to do a race and instantly retry.  All the "open world" means to me in a game like this is that I'll be wandering looking for something to do, getting lost in what should be a simply point to point race, or having to drive back to the start of a race that I simply want to instantly restart.  I really don't understand these design decisions and I'm really sick of the game press and Alex Ward from Criterion telling me that because I don't like the new direction that somehow makes me closed minded.  Maybe it's just not very good.

Downloaded the demo, and I think its brillant. Cunning use of the underused Xbox Camera for the Driver's License photo and photos showing player's reactions during takedowns when online. The damage and deformation engine is simply astounding. Cars hit, damage, crush, crumple, and dent just how one would expect them to, and it feels totally authentic. The races and other driving missions are a little tough to redo if failed or whatnot, but the complete forgiving of damage and wrecked cars is inspired, pushing players to wreck in a most spectacular manner. Reminds me of the days of Road Rash yore. Plus, the whole online interface is inspired with the Freeburn mode and the continuous, but relaxed tracking of stats like longest jump, most barrel rolls, and largest drift.

All in all, this demo did exactly what it was meant to do, made me a solid hash mark in the buy category.

I was a huge fan of Burnout 2, but despite the near-universal praise for Burnout 3 I thought it had gotten away from being a fun arcade racer (... that happened to feature crazy crashes) and turned into a crazed crash simulator (... that you occasionally got to race around a bit in).

More than anything else, I hope they somehow find a way to keep the "party game" aspect of crash mode alive in the new version - it's one of the few games my mother actually has a blast playing, because she's so horrible at racing games normally that she turns out to be OUTSTANDING at panicking and sending her car flying into traffic at the exact right moment to wipe out 30 cars at once.

I like a lot of ideas in this, but I hope they don't sacrifice what made Burnout so much more fun than other racing games in its early incarnations.

I've spent the afternoon playing it with my 5 year old son, and we're both loving it. As a Burnout fan since Burnout 2: Point of Impact, I've had my beefs and blessings for the series' evolution, but Criterion seems right on track to deliver a perfectly outrageous and fun driving game, despite some of its questionable aesthetic and gameplay changes (no Crash mode!? D'OH!).

I remember saying that there was no way that Burnout 3 could be topped. Then came Burnout: Takedown. I then adopted a similar mentality for that game. It looks like Criterion is going to top their previous effort once again.

'Those of you in possession of an Xbox 360 or a Playstation 3, download the newly available demo and let us know what you think."

Interesting approach, N'Gai.  Is the point to start a conversation on a game rather than delivering a review from on high?

With the high speed of communication possible here, perhaps this is a remedy to the awful "industry" of game reviews.  The reviewer puts out some thoughts, gets feedback, and posts both his or her response and the feedback to allow a general consumer to decide whether to buy the game.