Fatal Inertia Ex review

Launch title? It was meant to be, yes. But now Fatal Inertia is finally here, albeit as a PS Store release. And comparisons with WipEout are inevitable. Both are futuristic racers with anti-gravity craft and magnetic weaponry, but, well… one’s a lot better than the other.

Comparisons aside, there’s an abundance of features to get stuck into. There are four classes of racers, each with their own advantages and disadvantages. Mercury ships handle the best, Phoenixes are a good all-rounder, while Aurora craft are the fastest and Titans are destruction kings. The craft feel quite comfortable. Simple, but effective controls make it quite easy to master your racers. Too easy, if anything - there’s no challenge here. If you go off course, you can tap a button to be replaced on the track: a very handy feature sometimes, but it adds to the lack of toughness.

There are four race modes that challenge you to employ different racing tactics. For example, Velocity makes weapon pads give out boost items to encourage fast action, while Knockout eliminates the last racer in each lap. So at least there’s variety. The problem with FIE is that it has the makings of an adrenaline-fuelled racer to rival WipEout. But it’s so easy you’ll win every time, and it quickly becomes dull. Not worth the wait.

Jun 3, 2008