Asphalt: Urban GT Critic Reviews

It's like "Need for Speed Underground" meets "Burnout," and it's portable on the Nintendo DS! We highly recommend it.

Players who enjoy earning vehicles and the funds necessary to pimp them out should especially enjoy it. It will take you quite some time to complete everything, and it really does feel like a full-fledged console racer that you can take with you on the road.

While it doesn’t use the system’s power to the fullest (no touchscreen usefulness or multiplayer modes without multiple titles), it’s a decent enough game that’s worth your time and money if you’re into the racing genre on the go.

It wouldn’t have the same pizzazz on Nintendo GameCube unless the graphics and physics were improved tenfold.

The gameplay is fast and accessible, and there's enough variety in both the single- and multiplayer modes that you could spend a lot of time with the game.

With a high sense of speed, and a wide variety of gameplay, for the first time racing feels appropriate for the handheld scene. Aside from some frustrating traffic and driving issues, the graphics, controls, style and use of touch screen really brings out the best in this oft-mediocre driving series.

A gorgeous game by any standards.

Asphalt Urban GT doesn't participate in much of the innovation that makes the DS special, but oddly enough, it's still a fun racer that offers some very cool multiplayer features.

The gameplay is a bit primitive but still fun and challenging. My only regret is that the dual screen wasn’t used more prominently in the game. As it is, graphics not withstanding, this game could have been released for the GBA.

Unfortunately, it lacks the solid arcade racing feel of a game like Burnout, or Ridge Racer, or Gran Turismo itself.

One thing that the other launch titles have shown is that navigating the menus in DS games can be very simple and straightforward. Here though the whole system is clunky, with some icons placed on the touch screen being so small you need to use the stylus.

The game does look good, though. And control is tight. Which means that while it may not be inspiring, it's perfectly playable -- arguably the best handheld racing game ever made.

The nine racing locations, which include Las Vegas and Paris, are dramatically lit and loaded with intricate textures, making the surroundings so busy at times that it can be difficult to see the track.

Not a bad game, but it seems very rushed. It also feels like the N-gage game, which downright sucked. But the framerate seems much faster, and the fact that the map is at the bottom is cool.

A quality title that suffers from the fact that it had to be a little rushed. However, the fast game play and addictive career mode kept us coming back.

Your friends won’t like it because it’s too hard, and you might get bored because once you master the funky physics it becomes pretty repetitive.

Slow-paced and lackluster.

Asphalt's downfall is its off-balance racing. The addition of turbo boosts just doesn't make sense in this particular race.

On a basic level, however, the game's still fun - simple, yes, but immediately engaging no matter what kind of gamer you are.

For every few strides Asphalt: Urban GT takes, it seems to stumble once. In the end, it's serviceable, very good-looking, but by no means an outstanding portable racer.