We were fully excited, almost carried away with the idea of being able to translate the offline gameplay into six player racing, Party Crash and the rest. Once EA inked that deal with Microsoft back at E3 we knew our Burnout 3 dreams were going to come true. What did we expect from Burnout 3? More tracks, modes, cars, better graphics? Naturally. Now not only does it have the world's best arcade racing developer, but the industry's leading middleware provider. EA was so impressed it then bought the bloody company only a few months later in as canny a piece of games industry business as you'll ever see. You can see it, hear it and feel it everywhere, but given Criterion's love for SSX it was undeniably a match made in heaven when EA jumped the queue and snapped up the rights to publish the game from under everyone else's noses. The influence EA has had on Burnout 3's gestation cannot be underestimated, but rather than being forced it's a mutual appreciation.

Would it be diluted for the masses, or would the Brits hold out and stick to their guns? Burnout: Tricky

The question that troubled hardcore followers of the series though was just how evident EA's paw prints would be on the game. Criterion has, over the last three years, carved a category all of its own, featuring a crash-based all-action style of racing that no other game has come anywhere near to matching. If Burnout 3 sells less than four times what its predecessor sold we'd be very surprised indeed.ĭespite EA already having a best seller in the racing genre in Need For Speed Underground, it was a no-brainer for EA to sign Burnout 3. Acclaim's loss was very much EA's gain, and if any games publisher in the world knows how to sell to the Yanks, it's EA. They couldn't have been more wrong, and the fact that it still stands out as one of the best looking games and most addictive ever says a lot.

Maybe it was Acclaim's ongoing inability to compete with the big guns in the US that was to blame, or maybe consumers weren't that convinced about the original and wrongly assumed the quick-fire sequel would be more of the same.

It seems utter madness that a game of the quality of Burnout 2 wasn't a massive hit outside of Europe.

Burnout 3 takedown xbox cover