Geekscape Games Geek Peek Review: ‘Test Drive: Ferrari Racing Legends’

Test Drive: Ferrari Racing Legends wants to take you for a ride in some exotic cars and to give players a history lesson of the Ferrari brand. What I ended up getting was a lesson in bland and missed potential.

Coming off the successful Need for Speed: Shift and Shift 2: Unlimited, I was ready for Slightly Mad Games to bring the exceptional stylings put into those titles to Ferrari Racing Legends. Right away you get a bare bones menu system. Nothing but the video that was in the announcement trailer and two button prompts greet you when the game loads up. Jumping into the campaign, things were too monotonous. From the bland scenery to driving the same track over and over ad nauseum, I never wanted to fall asleep more than I did while at the wheel of Ferrari Racing Legends.

Even with all the driving aids turned on, the controls were so damn touchy that any mistake made meant starting the race over from the beginning. Having the A.I. in the game make all the turns perfectly on the lowest difficulty setting was a good way of mocking my inabilities to control the same cars they were driving. The one thing I was going to praise about the game was how in your face the engine sounds were. The sounds left an impression that this is what it would really sound like racing one of these fantastic exotic machines. That impression turned into that bothersome feeling you get when a bug is buzzing in your ear after an hour of playing.

Test Drive as a series never quite hit home for me. With most of the titles in the series, you could see something of a good racing game forming but the muck and grime of poor controls, bland environments and not enough diversity makes Test Drive: Ferrari Racing Legends stall before leaving the show floor.