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The original Wipeout was one of those early Playstation games that was obviously a transitional title from the older 16 bit machines. While it was fun, it also seemed to indicate that the designers knew that the hardware of the Playstaion was cool, but they weren’t quite sure what to do with it. Their response was to use the polygonal power of the Playstation to create a more immersive version of a 16 bit racing game.

To a large extent, they succeeded, but I heard more people comment about its amazing soundtrack than its amazing gameplay. A sequel followed, and while it was fun, I also felt that the strongest aspect of the game was the music. That usually doesn’t bode to well for a game, unfortunately.

Fast forward a few years, and you will find the third game to wear the Wipeout title. This time everything has been refined. It’s about time. The gameplay and graphics have finally reached their peak, but surprisingly, the music has fallen from its high pedestal.

The basics of gameplay have remained the same as in the previous Wipeout games. You have a choice of hovercrafts that you must drive around a track at high speeds. Weapons and speedups are placed generously along the track to make life a little more interesting.

There are eight different hovercrafts in the game, with four being available initially. Each of the hovercrafts you can fly has a different balance of thrust, speed, shields, and handling. The edge definitely belongs to the higher combination of speed and handling. The computer does not use its hovercrafts to its greatest advantage, though, so even if you use the slowest craft you will still be able to pass any of the computer opponents.

The weapons available to you range from mines to help shake that guy who just won’t get off your tail, to the plasma bolt that instantly eliminates a player from the race. In addition, you can also pick up defensive items such as a temporary autopilot and deflecting shields.

Wipeout 3 features a number of race modes including a single track race, tournament circuits, time trial, and eliminator. In order to advance to each successive round of tournaments, you must place first overall in the current tournament. If you’re really good, you can reveal a special round. I’m not that good, and that’s the problem.

I was able to fly through the first tournament round without a problem, but the second round really gave me trouble. I tried and tried, and no matter how well I knew the course or how in-the-zone I was, I couldn’t manage to place first in the tournament. I was ready to give up and just say the game was too hard. Finally, after much frustration, I played it in two player mode with a friend and was able to beat it.

Part of the problem was that in Wipeout 3, it’s you versus the computer. They never shoot each other on purpose. That means that once you’re behind, you have a lot of catching up to do and you can’t expect any help from your enemies. To make up for it, the computers race the course slowly, but without hitting walls. I prefer a decent AI that treats everyone as an opponent over one that drives slowly so it can let me win.

Enough about the technicalities of playing Wipeout 3. The important thing is the experience, how fun it is, and Wipeout 3 is plenty fun. It gives an amazing feeling of speed as you soar down the courses, taking the turns at incredible speeds. The gameplay of Wipeout 3 is finally its selling feature, so if you weren’t incredibly impressed with the first two, you will want to check this out.

Wipeout 3 gives you the opportunity to play with a friend using a screen split either horizontally or vertically. Not only is this fun, but it’s the only way I was able to get through the second tournament. Two heads are better than one. Just make sure your friend doesn’t blow you out of the race.

I had hoped for more circuits to race on, but the difficulty level of Wipeout 3 will keep you playing through the ones that do exist for a long time. That may not be a good thing if you get frustrated easily, though.

The two player mode does help a lot because it’s always fun to play against your friends, no matter what the game. Although the extra race modes such as time trial and eliminator are good for breaking up the monotony of tournament play, they aren’t a terribly large departure from the standard fare and will probably not add too much to the longevity of the title.

Wipeout 3 supports both digital and analog controls, but my preference is strongly to the analog. One of the most important things to learn about the controls is that it’s OK to take your finger off of the accelerator. In fact, it’s necessary if you don’t want to crash into the walls on every turn.

The controls are totally customizable, too, so if you’re like me you’ll want to switch some of the buttons around to make them more accessible.

The graphics in Wipeout 3 are brilliant. Although they aren’t the greatest graphics ever in terms of breathtaking sights and animation or original designs, it is very difficult to spot polygons anywhere. The textures on all of the objects are large enough to eliminate bad pixelization. I’m not sure how they managed to squeeze such large texture maps into the Playstation’s tiny memory, but they did!

Even with all of these excellent graphics features, the framerate never seems to drop below 30 fps with absolutely no clipping. The result is an immersive experience that draws you in the way very few games can.

Wipeout 3 isn’t devoid of small details, either. Clothes hang out to dry above the racetrack, and a monorail passes by complete with sound. These little details do a lot to add to the realism of the atmosphere, and it’s amazing that they’re in there without slowing anything down.

My only complaint about the graphics is with the text in the menus. The futuristic looking font is very hard to read because a lot of the letters look funky, and it is almost impossible to read the ship statistics on the hovercraft-choosing screen. The text is so small that it all blurs together. There was plenty of empty space on the screen, too, so it’s not clear to me why they skimped on the size.

For once the audio in a Wipeout game is less than outstanding. I don’t know if it was done on purpose or not, but the music in Wipeout 3 really falls flat. The music consists entirely of uninspiring techno. This stuff may have sounded cool a couple years ago, but the art of techno has advanced way beyond what can be found on the Wipeout 3 disc. It’s pretty much just a boring beat with a little bit of lousy synth sounds.

The sound effects aren’t anything spectacular, either. They’re not bad, but merely the typical types of explosions and engine sounds you would expect from this kind of game. In addition, the voice that tells you what items you pick up gets really confusing in two player mode because it’s not clear who it’s talking to. That means you have to pay special attention to what you have because you can’t count on the voice to do it. They probably should have either cut it entirely or used a man’s voice for one player and a woman’s voice for the second.

Over all Wipeout 3 is a strong title. It has excellent gameplay and graphics, but it’s just too hard in the later levels. There are some parts of the game that seem to either require that you be travelling very slowly or have autopilot on in order to get by them. Although the music isn’t so great, in the case of the Wipeout series I consider that a plus. Now this series can finally be appreciated for its gameplay.

Unless you are a major fan of the series, I would recommend this as a renter. Despite its excellent graphics and gameplay, if you play it hard over one weekend, you will probably get to a point where you just can’t beat the next level. It seems as though overly difficult gameplay was implemented instead of having a large library of race circuits.

I really hate being frustrated by games, and this is Wipeout 3’s major drawback. Although I don’t get frustrated too easily, at some point I say enough is enough. If I shell out the cash to buy a game I expect it to be solid fun. Wipeout 3's single player mode provided me with ample reasons to tear out my hair, but in two player mode those concerns were thrown to the wind. The bottom line? If you have no friends to play with, this title may not be for you, but if you do lots of multiplayer then you will really dig Wipeout 3.

Finally, this is only the second title I have reviewed to get the girlfriend’s stamp of approval award. This is a good bet if you’re looking for some multiplayer action for your less video game oriented friends to sink their teeth into!