Fast & Furious Crossroads - Title preview with Vin Diesel

Shown during The Game Awards 2019, as the latest title presented prior to the announcement of the Game of the Year Award-winning game, Fast & Furious Crossroads immediately made headlines. To announce it on the stage of the prestigious event were two of the protagonists of the famous film series: Vin Diesel e Michelle Rodriguez. But what should we expect from the title developed by Slightly Mad Studios and produced by Bandai Namco? By analyzing the trailer and the very little information available, we will try to take stock of the situation and find out everything there is for now to know about the title. You are ready? Start your engines, you are about to read the preview of Fast & Furious Crossroads!

Fast and furious…

So let's start, as already mentioned, with the analysis of the trailer. In the video shown during the Los Angeles demonstration, we immediately notice the presence of some of the protagonists of the film saga. In particular, we can observe the polygonal counterparts of Leticia Ortiz, played by Michelle Rodriguez, Roman Pearce, played by Tyrese Gibson, and the iconic Dominic Toretto, played by Vin Diesel. These are obviously not the only characters in the movie: in fact, there are unpublished actors and roles for the saga, written specifically for Fast & Furious Crossroads. We still don't know who these figures will be, but the trailer shows that they are Dominic's old acquaintances, and that they turn to the pilot for help. It must be said that it is precisely the character played by Vin Diesel to dominate the scene, a bit like what happens in the cinema.

Having reviewed the characters, let's focus on the core of the title: he ran into the street. The first car we see, which is also the one that opens the trailer, is the historic 1969 Yenko Camaro (driven in the second installment of the film series by Brian O'Conner, played by the late Paul Walker) chased by a police car. Later we see the video game approaching the most recent films of the saga: in fact we find a vehicle very similar to a tank, as happens in the last chapters of Fast & Furious, which have detached themselves from the bare and raw concept of clandestine car racing, embracing a kind much more adrenaline and close to action movies.

Train assaults, wrecking balls, explosions and more explosions characterize the second part of the trailer. This suggests that Slightly Mad Studios has decided to embrace all phases of the saga and therefore the title will not only include simple races, alternating them with more action moments. All this is accompanied, as is strongly evidenced by the announcement trailer, by a very strong narrative component that will reconnect to the film saga.

… But not enough!

To leave you speechless, unfortunately in a far from positive sense, is what seems to shine through technical sector. Fast & Furious Crossroads seems, quite frankly, to be left behind by a generation. The title presents decidedly careless polygonal models and animations and facial expressions not in line with modern canons, but above all disproportionate dimensions of the characters' bodies. Clearly we are talking only of the hot impressions born from a simple trailer, but you don't need a careful eye to the thousandth to notice the various defects.

It is absolutely not our intention to judge the game without having tried it firsthand, but having to analyze what has been shown, we can only define ourselves perplexed. However, remember that the Slightly Mad Studios boast the series of Project Cars 2, which despite some defects boasts a high level graphics sector. The dubious quality of the technical sector could therefore be attributable to a hurried realization of the trailer, without being able - for timing reasons - to guarantee an excellent result. Clearly, given the working hand, we can expect that in terms of playing the driving sections will prove to be qualitatively excellent, but also for this we will have to wait to be able to get our hands on the game.

In short, Fast & Furious Crossroads presents itself with many doubts, but we are still curious to find out, perhaps with some due care, how pad in hand will behave. We remind you that the title will arrive on PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in May next year, coinciding with the release of Fast & Furious 9.