Course design is also a factor in LA Rush's many failures. Many of the objects here are destructible. Which ones? It's hard to tell. Fences and lamp posts, some trees and hydrants are all breakable. Some walls and bigger objects are too. But in the heat of a race, when the last 100 yards are there, and you take a shortcut and slam into a wall, a corner, or building that doesn't break? You'll grow an incredible large and quick distaste for LA Rush. There are shortcuts and ramps, too, but they don't play nearly enough of a role in the way LA Rush is designed, and the game doesn't play, look, or feel anything like any previous Rush game.
Lastly, perhaps the most annoying part of LA Rush is the non-skippable crash scenes. OH MY FREAKIN' GOD. Each time you crash, and that's a lot no matter your skill, you have to watch a crash cutscene. These serve one purpose: to show off the particle engine at work. It's cool the frist time; every time after it really stinks. You can fast-forward through some of this cutscene, but that's not enough. When you crash, you want to get back into the game as fast as possible, and these scenes linger for no good reason on your failure, even rubbing it in. Sure, Burnout has slow-motion crash scenes, but in them you affect gameplay. Here, you just suffer.
Whether you call this LA Rush, or LA Rash, this game is not worth your while. The more you play it, the less fun it gets. This game tarnishes the Rush brand by having nothing to do with the previous series, and it retains none of the fun elements to lift it into the future. If you're a big Rush fan, you'll be disappointed by this one, but even more to the point, if you own Midnight Club 3 or Need for Speed 2, you won't need to buy this, because it's not as good as either of those.
