NASCAR 2005: Chae for the Cup

If you are a NASCAR fan, Chase for the Cup offers everything you could ever want in a game. This is as close as most people are going to get to being a driver on the Nextel Cup series, and NASCAR 2005 does an excellent job of capturing the look and feel of the sport. A few drivers and tracks are missing, but what is included is extremely detailed and should make race fans feel right at home. This game is great and is highly recommended.

Single Player Bliss and Great Online Play

NASCAR 2005 has a ton of modes and features that will keep you busy for quite some time. You can find 25 official tracks along with 130 drivers from the Nextel Cup, Busch Series (called NASCAR National Series in the game), Craftsman Truck Series, and NASCAR Featherlite Modified Series. In Race Now mode, you can participate in any race you want to from any of the four series. Season mode allows you to run a full season in any of the series. The Chase for the Cup mode fast forwards the Nextel Cup series to the final ten races so you can compete for the championship. There are also other modes that allow players to test their skills in various race situations. In some modes you can even use Dodge Vipers or Corvettes if you want.

New to Xbox this year is the ability to race online. Up to four human drivers and as many as 40 AI drivers can compete in online races. Features like voice chat, leaderboards, and all of that stuff is included as well. The game runs surprisingly smooth and is relatively lag free. The only complaint about the online mode is that when a race is over you are dumped to the main lobby, which makes racing with the same people more than once more difficult than it really should be.

Fight to the Top

The feature that will consume the most of your time is the Fight to the Top mode. In this mode, you start out as a rookie driver in the Featherlite series and work your way up to the Nextel Cup. If you want, you can choose to just race in one series and likely dominate, or you can race in multiple series at the same time. Fight to the Top mode covers several seasons and you have a lot of options about how you want your career to go. You can participate in charity events and autograph signings and you can even buy and manage a team when you have earned enough money. Being a team owner is a tough job and you have to hire drivers and pit crew, set merchandise prices, design paint schemes, and even upgrade your car. There is a lot to do, but you always have a choice and can completely dictate how your career progresses.

Real NASCAR Racing

Where NASCAR 2005 really shines is out on the track. The game has the perfect balance of precision and chaos. The controls are good enough that you can make it through each corner with no problems if you drive correctly. Deviate just inches from where you should be, however, and you risk slamming into the wall or spinning out. It isn’t hard to drive a good race, but it isn’t easy, either. When you throw the AI drivers into the mix the game gets a whole lot more interesting. They behave very realistically, so they are just as likely to screw up a turn as you are so you always have to be aware of what is going on around you. Unlike past NASCAR games where the computer controlled drivers seemingly couldn’t crash, in 2005, crashes and spinouts play a big role. You never know when someone is going to screw up, whether it is you or the AI, and you can and will get caught up in “the big one” every once in a while. That thrill of pure unpredictability is what makes NASCAR so fun to watch and NASCAR 2005 so fun to play.