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A totally different kind of MMORPG that reminds us why car combat is fun.

If you, like me, were a boy-child who grew up in the 70’s and 80’s, there was one thing that you wished you could be in about 1984 or so. That thing was Mel Gibson as he appears in The Road Warrior. Max, Gibson’s character, was nothing short of badass with a capital BAD and, as Twisted Metal proved years later, driving around in cars and shooting at other cars is definitely cool. If only we could live the dream.

Now, in a sense, we can. Auto Assault, the new MMORPG from NCsoft reminds us just what was so cool about vehicular manslaughter acted out on a grand scale. The concept is simple: take one part Twisted Metal; one part Road Warrior or maybe even something as cheesy as Damnation Alley; and one part EverQuest, add a liberal helping of Burnout (sans the incredible sense of speed, unfortunately) and shake vigorously. The end result is an MMORPG unlike any that we’ve seen before.



This is a good and a bad thing at the same time. Will Auto Assault compete with the likes of EverCrack and World of Warcraft? Probably not. But in a world where the only real alternative to swords, sorcery, and dungeon spelunking has been life in George Lucas’ galaxy far far away, it’s a nice option.

Graphically, Auto Assault has the nuts – if your machine is equipped to run it. Anything less than one of the latest $600.00 graphics cards and you’ll be seeing a lot of muddy browns and dull fireworks. You may need to invest in a new hard drive or at least clear out a lot of your MP3 collection as well, because this baby is gonna take up about ten gigs of drive space.

In terms of gameplay, Auto Assault is pretty tight. You’ll choose one of several races/factions, all of whom are vying for control and slugging it out in full-on car combat. The combat system works well and the driving physics are passable if not perfect. It’s not going to win any major awards or draw throngs of players away from established MMORPGs, but it is definitely worth a look – especially if you’ve grown weary of casting spells and swinging swords.



The Limited Edition of the game is fairly nice too, as it comes with a Logitech headset for voice chat, a CD of music from the game, and a free starter deck for the Auto Assault online trading card game (see below). All in all Auto Assault is a solid title with a few flaws, a demanding graphics engine, and a nice diversion from the typical MMORPG formula.

Review by Michael Triggs.