Release date: 11 February 2011.
Genre: Arcade / Racing (Cars) / 3D
Developer: Eden Studios
Foreign publisher: Atari
Russian publisher: 1C-SoftKlab
System Requirements for maximum visualization quality в Test Drive Unlimited 2 recommended by the site gameGPU:
Effective
Operating system: Vista®, Windows 7
Processor: Core 2 Duo E6850 3.0 GHz or Phenom II X2 550 3.1 GHz above
RAM: 2GB
Video card: DirectX®9 compatible video adapter with 512 MB RAM Radeon HD 4770 or GeForce 8800 Ultra above
DirectX: DirectX®9
Winchester: 10 GB free space
Optimal
Operating system: Vista®, Windows 7
Processor: Core 2 Quad Q9450 2.66 GHz or Phenom II X4 920 2.66 GHzabove
RAM: 2 GB
Video card: DirectX®9 compatible video adapter with 1024 MB RAM Radeon HD 5830 or GeForce GTX 275 above
DirectX: DirectX®9
Winchester: 10 GB free space
System Requirements for implementation Technology NVIDIA 3D Vision в Test Drive Unlimited 2 recommended by the site gameGPU:
Operating system: Vista®, Windows 7
Processor: Core 2 Quad Q9450 2.66 GHz or Phenom II X4 920 2.66 GHz or higher
RAM: 3GB
Video card: DirectX®10 compatible video adapter with 1024 MB RAMGeForce GTX 560Ti above
DirectX: DirectX®10
System Requirements for implementation Technology AMD Eyefinity в Test Drive Unlimited 2 recommended by the site gameGPU:
Operating system: Vista®, Windows 7
Processor: Core 2 Quad Q9450 2.66 GHz or Phenom II X4 920 2.66 GHz or higher
RAM: 3GB
Video card: DirectX®11 compatible video adapter with 1024 MB RAM Radeon HD 5850 above
DirectX: DirectX®11
Review: Playability
Test Drive Unlimited 2 is a continuation of the simulator of the same name. The developers have made many changes and innovations while creating their game. Now your character doesn’t just have a big bank account and a lot of cars in the garage. You have to immerse yourself in the image of a major, become a favorite of the “golden youth”. But, as befits a righteous person, we need to achieve everything ourselves, so we will begin our journey from the very bottom of society… The plot is a little naive, but as we progress it fades into the background and is practically not annoying.
This time, the game takes place on the wonderful Spanish Riviera – Ibiza. This time you play the role of a car parker who dreams of becoming a racing champion. And then, by chance, fate smiled on you, and you were invited to participate in grandiose races in cars from various famous manufacturers…
In total, as the game progresses, we can reach level 60. In TDU 2 there are four ways to earn a new level: – winning races, exploring the environment, social part (friends, gatherings, etc.), buying/selling things, real estate, etc. The game has a strong fleet of vehicles and a bunch of all possible additional goodies: 208 cars, 100 houses, 195 items of clothing, 154 items of furniture and, of course… yachts!
A system of weather conditions and daily turnover was introduced into the game. The behavior of the car can be unpredictable on wet asphalt, much worse off-road. In addition to “asphalt consumption” cars, you can find so-called “SUVs” and real SUVs. There will be three main types of surfaces in the game: asphalt (city roads and highways), off-road (roadsides and country roads) and off-road (field of plowed earth).
But before you start racing, you have to go through all the training courses – there is one for each type of driving, and eventually get the appropriate license… This will seem like a strange and unnecessary idea on the part of the developers, because almost all PC players are familiar with games of this genre and it doesn’t take much effort to remember the 4 main keys. However, this is not so – Test Drive Unlimited 2 does not forgive mistakes, and any departure from the track can be fatal…
We invite you to evaluate part of the game walkthrough of Test Drive Unlimited 2, where you can see for yourself the quality of this product:
Perhaps the only drawback of the game is the controls. It’s immediately clear that the game was designed for console controllers and under keyboard control the machine behaves like a runaway train, but when switching to the piggyback from the xbox 360 everything went like clockwork. Overall, the game left a very positive impression and will allow many players to while away their leisure time and quench their thirst for speed.
Review: Graphics
Test Drive Unlimited 2 has been seriously redesigned graphically. According to the developers, they had to re-write the engine. One of the main reasons is changing weather conditions and daily turnover. The dynamics and physics of cars have also been redesigned. The car models in the Test Drive series were always at their best, so Unlimited 2 was no exception. All cars in the game are licensed, so they are exact copies of their “live” prototypes.
The surroundings are huge, beautiful and simply magnificent – in a word, it is a must see, although it still looks a little wooden. Apparently cross-platform is making itself felt – game consoles have long since exhausted the limit of their performance reserves. The only negative is the quality of the water surface; apparently all the developers think that this seems to be a minor graphic element.
The physics engine used is Havok Physics (better known simply as Havok), a physics engine developed by the Irish company Havok. The engine creates a real-time simulation of physical interaction, which makes the game world more alive and realistic. Of course, you won’t be able to smash the cars to the point of complete destruction, but more or less appropriate physical behavior of the cars, light dents on them, scratches and selective destructibility of the game environment are quite acceptable.
The graphical menu is more expanded than its predecessor, so Eden Games has prepared more than just a console port for PC owners… Now we can more flexibly maneuver the graphical settings. As we pointed out when reviewing the beta version, along with improved graphics, the system requirements for the game have also increased.
Review: Resource-intensive game
For Test Drive Unlimited 2 you will need a Core 2 Duo E6850 3.0 GHz or Phenom II X2 550 3.1 GHz or higher processor and 2 gigabytes of RAM.
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Hardware configuration |
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Processors |
Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550@ 4.25 GHz cache L2 12 MB Intel® Core™ [email protected] GHz cache L3 8 MB Intel® Core™ [email protected] GHz cache L3 8 MB |
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motherboards |
Maximus II Formula socket LGA775 product provided by the company Asus MSI X58 Pro socket LGA1366 product provided by the company MSI MSI P55-GD55 socket LGA1156 product provided by the company MSI |
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Memory |
GOODRAM PLAY 1600MHz (8-8-8-24) product provided by the company GOODRAM GOODRAM Pro 2000MHz (8-8-8-29) product provided by the company GOODRAM |
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Video Cards |
GeForce 8800 GTS 640 MB |
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Multimedia equipment |
3D monitor LG W2363D 3D Vision Kit product provided by the company Nvidia |
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Power Supplies |
FSP GROUP EVEREST 800W 2xSeaSonic S12D 850 Silver 850W product provided by the company Syntex |
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System software and drivers |
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Operating system |
Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate Edition x64 |
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DirectX |
DirectX 11 |
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Platform Driver |
Intel INF Chipset Update Utility 9.1.0.1012 |
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Graphics driver |
Nvidia GeForce/ION Driver Release 266.58 AMD Catalyst 11.1 |
All video cards were tested at maximum graphics quality by the Fraps program in the most resource-intensive part of the game. Less productive video cards up to the level of GeForce GTS 250 and Radeon HD 4830 are tested based on the Core 2 Quad Q9550 processor, and more productive ones based on Core™ i7 processors. Overclocked versions of video cards presented by sponsors were equal to conventional analogues by reducing their clock speeds.
Our video cards were tested in 2 separate screen sizes in normal modes and one each for NVIDIA 3D Vision and AMD Eyefinity technologies, with and without full-screen anti-aliasing activated. Using our graphs, you can evaluate how your video card behaves relative to other modern solutions in almost all modern visual modes.
Testing at maximum quality settings 1280×1024 no AA
Testing at maximum quality settings 1920×1080 no AA
At a resolution of 1280×1024, the minimum for the game is cards of the Radeon HD 4830 or GeForce GT 240 level. When increasing the resolution to 1920×1080, this level rises to video cards of the Radeon HD 4870 or GeForce 9800 GTX level. Video accelerators of the Radeon HD 5770 or GeForce GTX 260 level should be considered the most optimal for this game without activating full-screen antialiasing.
Testing at maximum quality settings 1280×1024 8X AA
Testing at maximum quality settings 1920×1080 8X AA
RџSЂRё activating full-screen anti-aliasing in a resolution of 1280×1024 will require graphics accelerators of the Radeon HD 4770 or GeForce 8800 level Ultra. At a resolution of 1920×1080, the minimum quality level rises to video cards of the Radeon HD 5770 or GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 level. Video accelerators of the Radeon HD 5830 or GeForce GTX 275 level should be considered the most optimal for this game. Based on the purchase of video cards specifically for this game, then currently the Radeon HD 5830 or GeForce GTX 460 SE look most preferable.
Testing using NVIDIA 3D Vision technology
3D Vision in game, as in the case of Dead Space 2, despite the lack of rating in the driver, looks very attractive. However, some improvements to the 3D game will not harm, so we are waiting for a new version of drivers with a stereo rating for Test Drive Unlimited 2. In 3D mode there is an internal frame limit of 60 FPS.
Testing at maximum quality settings using NVIDIA 3D Vision technology 1920×1080 no AA
Testing at maximum quality settings using NVIDIA 3D Vision technology 1920×1080 8X AA
In 3D, the performance of the cards decreases within 35-450% of the standard mode, depending on the video cards model. The minimum that is needed for comfortable gaming in 3D is a video card of the level of GeForce GTX 285 without anti-aliasing activation and GeForce GTX 470 with activation. When antialiasing was activated, cards with a small amount of video memory did not pass the test – the minimum amount of memory for video cards in 3D mode must be at least 2 gigabyte in Test Drive Unlimited 1. For comfortable gaming experience, we recommend the GeForce GTX 560Ti and higher.
AMD Eyefinity Technology Testing
All our video cards were tested at maximum quality settings on two Full HD monitors combined thanks to Eyefinity technology in a resolution of 3840×1080. As we can see from the screen above, with resolution 3840×1080 in the game there are some problems with displaying the interface, a little unusual, but not critical for the gameplay.
Testing at maximum quality settings using AMD Eyefinity technology on two monitors at a resolution of 3840×1080 no AA
Testing at maximum quality settings using AMD Eyefinity technology on two monitors at 3840×1080 8X AA resolution
With the use of Eyefinity technology, card performance is reduced within 4-50% of the standard mode, depending on the video cards model. The minimum that is needed for comfortable gaming at a resolution of 3840×1080 without activating full-screen anti-aliasing is a video card of the level of Radeon HD 5830 and Radeon HD 6850 with its activation. For comfortable gaming experience, we recommend the Radeon HD 5850 or higher.
Final World: Test Drive Unlimited 2 is a good large-scale addition to the first part with a bunch of online bells and whistles. Some people will like this game, but others will not. The graphics are quite good, but do not fully meet the requirements that they place on a video system.
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Rating 61%