Asphalt 4 : Elite racing is an arcade racing game for Nokia’s N-gage platform from Gameloft, and is the successor to Asphalt 3 : Street Rules.
I took version 4 out for a little test drive over the week. Was it way better than its predescessor ? Worth buying ? Read the review to find out !
Gameplay :
Asphalt 4 : Elite Racing is the latest sequel to the Asphalt series on N-Gage.
Asphalt has always been a very arcadey-ish kind of racer game. Which means, it isnt anywhere near real driving. All the crazy physics in the game and the insane driving contributes to the “fun” of playing the game. If you’re ever played “Burnout” on playstaion or xbox, this is kinda like it, but on a small screen.
In Asphalt 4, just like its predecessor, the game is based on street racing, and you basically have to do everything illegal you can think of while driving,like taking down other cars, driving on the wrong side of the road, etc. The more illegal things you do, the higher the score or cash you get. In this case, you could finish first, but still have a low score if you didnt do enough. You’ll have to master Nitro boosts and how to use it effectively, and earn it back by drifting around every corner or by picking it up along the racetrack. There are various game modes to test this though.
To make you feel like more of a bad boy, the more illegal things you do, the more likelihood that the police will start chasing after you and you’ll see a police badge on the screen to let you know that a police car or motorbike is on your tail.
But you can choose to outrun them or take them down to get a cash and point bonus. If you get caught though, you’ll have to pay a huge penalty.All this also attracts the attention of the media and they’ll send a news helicopters after you. Which makes your screen view suddenly temporarily changes to a birds eye top-down view of your car and the road, so it seems like you’re looking through the camera of a news report.
This sudden screen change is slightly annoying imho, because you’re suddenly changed from behind your car to the birds eye view, and hence the controls change a little, but its livable.
You can also “Choose your lady”. Each lady has an extra bonus which helps you out in someway. Example, one will help keep the police off your tail, etc.
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New Ladies, Garage Items and Events are unlocked as you go through the game and earn cash.
Locations :
When you start the game, you only have one location unlocked, that’s Los Angeles. But as you go through the game and earn more and more money, the other places open up.
There are totally six tracks totally, which are :
- Los Angeles
- New York
- Paris
- Monte Carlo
- Dubai
- Shanghai
Vehicles :
While you unlock new places with the more money you earn, you also unlock new vehicles and new engine parts. Asphalt 4 allows you to drive cars and, something I love, ride motorbikes !
Ofcourse the physics of the Motorbikes are slightly more insane than when you drive a car, but its fun. The engine parts you unlock can be added to your car/bike to increase or decrease a certain feature of your car. Example, something could increase your acceleration but make your handling worse at the same time. The garage parts menu displays the effect each part has on your vehicle’s abilities before you install it, to help you choose.
The game includes 28 cars & bikes including the Bugatti, Veryon, Ferrari F430 Spider, Nissan GT-R, Ducati 1098.
Whatever car or motorbike you choose, the other cars in the race are automatically chosen to match it.
Game Modes :
There are totally five game modes which are unlocked eventually, each covering a different type of gameplay style, all pretty fun:
- Race:
A three lap race to get to the finish line. You have to finish in the top 3 to keep any bonuses or cash you get.
- Beat ‘Em All:
Very close to Burnout’s gameplay. You have to push six other racers off the road before you’ve finished three laps or you’ll lose.
- Vs:
You race against another rival car to reach the finish line, but you have to win in two laps.
- Cash Attack:
Now this is the most fun and easy mode, in my opinion. In three laps, you must earn more than $20,000 by any means. If you earn less than this, you lose the race.
- Cop Chase:
You control a police car and you have to catch the leader of the street race, ignoring all the others.
The “rubber band” type gameplay of Asphalt 4 means you’re never too ahead or too far behind of your rivals. That being said, the strategy to win varies wildly from one mode to the other. In some modes like “Cash Attack” , you dont need to come in first place to win. But in “Race” you have to come first to win.
Orientation :
The game can be played in both portrait and landscape modes, according to which, the controls can be flipped to be on the other side of the phone.
Because it’s a racing game it felt more comfortable to play in landscape mode. But since some phones, like the N82 do not officially support Landscape mode in some N-gage games, I was forced to play it in portrait mode, but found it pretty okay.
Controls :
The controls of the game are almost the same in in all modes, with the most features accessible through the d-pad.
You can press up to use nitro, down for brakes, and left and right to steer. Drifts are pretty easy, you can either press a direction button twice to start drifting, or you can press 8 during a turn. If your phone has gaming keys (such as the N81, N95, N96, etc) you can drift by using the lower/second gaming button. Camera modes are controlled by the * and # buttons.
Graphics :
As far as phone games go, the graphics are pretty good. They’re not perfect, and nowhere near PSP or console level graphics today, but good enough. It would have been way better if they had used the graphics accelerator chip on certain N-Gage models, but since most newer N-series flagship phones do not come with one now, I’m not too certain they’ll start using it on N-gage anytime soon.
The background and roads are pretty detailed. You can see the other racers, other traffic, police cars, trams, helicopters etc. Each track looks different. Weather is non-existant though. So your favourite track will always be sunny, snowy or dark night depending on the track.
Frame rate wise, the game starts to slow down sometimes because there are too things appearing on screen at once, but nothing too bad.
Music :
Sound is pretty much what you’d expect from a racing game like this. Pop or techno-ish music here and there, rock makes an appearance every now and then.
The sound effects suit the game very well, although some motorbikes and cars didnt really sound anything like they’re supposed to.
Multiplayer and the N-Gage Arena :
Unfortch, the only N-gage Arena feature of Asphalt 4 is a rankings board. This means no head to head racing online, no online multiplayer, no shadow racing. Only high score posting.
This is a real shame, considering how popular shadow racing was in some racing games in the first generation of N-gage. So much potential.
But fortunately, there is 2 player bluetooth multiplayer support.
Asphalt 4, like most N-gage games now, have xbox-ish achievements called “Point Pickups” which you unlock while playing the game. This gives the game some replay value, seeing as you can play the game again to unlock something you forgot to earlier.
Each point pickup, gives you a certain amount of
NGP (N-Gage Points), which are added to your total NGP score of your N-gage account online. Right now NGP is only for bragging rights though.
Conclusion :
Is it worth buying ?
When it comes down to it, if you’re looking for a realistic racing simulator, Asphalt 4 probably isnt for you. If you’re looking for a fun and easy arcade racer then this is right up your alley. Its basically like a portable phone version of EA’s Burnout. The Point Pickups add to its replay value (that is if you dont unlock them all on your first go).
Is it a giant leap over its predecessor ? Not really. Its basically the same game as Asphalt 3, with a few extras thrown in.
Asphalt 4 has a pretty good selection of game modes, its fun and playable, and easy to pickup. While I still think the graphics could have used some improvement by making use of the onboard gfx acceleration in some on Nokia’s phones, they arnt too shabby. The lack of proper online gameplay is a huge disappointment though. The N-gage arena has a lot of potential and could have really made this game have a higher value for money.
I’d give it a 3 out of 5 overall.
You can find out more about the game over on its Official Game page or if you need tips or help with the game, head on over to the Official Asphalt 4 N-gage forum.
Clinton is currently based in New Delhi, India and is executive editor for UnleashThePhones. He is responsible for all editorial decisions, and covers all forms of Mobile things.
Cj is addicted to caffeine, social media, and technology. Always up for a good conversation, you can reach him through the contact form, his website, on Google Plus 
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