Commonplace

Burnout Paradise

Picked up the remaster on Switch thinking it was the game I played in undergrad - it's not. This one is “open world racing” meaning there's a big city you drive around and at any stoplight you can kick off an event. “Courses” aren't exactly marked, and at least as a new player it's very easy to take a wrong turn and totally ruin a race. Also there's no quick restart, which seems like a real failure of player-friendliness.

The actual racing feel is still good, but it's showing its age in lots of ways. The cars have a few stats but dramatic handling differences that aren't explained by any of the stats, and there's no browsable in-game help. I kind of wish I'd found Burnout Revenge which is the one I played in back in 2009.