Stuntman Ignition

Off road racing games are a difficult genre to master. Trying to balance the realistic specifics of the BMX scene while also crafting a fun game is no simple task, yet Stuntman: Ignition seems to have gotten it just right when it debuted just over 14 years ago. It had a great control scheme, plenty of challenges, and always felt like it had something new for you to do, even when you’d clocked in a ton of hours in one day. Its one of the few off-road, action racing games that’s able to get your hear racing along with it. It has a few flaws here and there, but overall, it’s a great experience that can keep you coming back endlessly.

Career Mode

What makes Stuntman: Ignition stand out among other competing titles is that it isn’t a time consuming game in a bad way. Like I said, you could drain hours into this game each day and it’ll feel worth it the whole way through. There’s no one portion or section that’s too grindy so it doesn’t feel like a chore to complete any part of the game. Career mode has six major ‘films’ that you’ll progress through during the game. Each one has different objectives on each map that can send you into chaos in fun/creative ways.

Once you’ve played enough, you’ll realize you can chain all these stunts together for a series of great combos and multipliers, which can provide yourself unique challenges on each course. You could also hop onto multiplayer for even greater levels of chaos. I personally loved how this was basically an action film stunt set turned into a game that had what felt like endless content (at least when I was younger). It was really a great way to keep things from getting too stale while playing – you won’t be required to grind parts of the game you’re not into for unlocks. It was basically a lighter take on the Need for Speed series while taking some cues for the combo chain gameplay from other stunt driving games like V-Rally 3.

The Controls

These are important for stunt games. A Stuntman title without proper physics and controls is bound to fall apart since, well, that’s what makes the game good or bad. Stuntman: Ignition was somewhere in the middle to me – it wasn’t terribly done, but it also wasn’t perfect either. Since you’ll be trying to make hairpin turns throughout the whole game, it means a lot that the controls need to be both responsive and easy to pick up.

Bottom Line

Overall, I’d say that these two criteria were met, though the responsiveness could’ve used some work. Still, its incredibly intuitive for the time and has a decent bit of polish. Plus, the gameplay loop is certainly never boring. Some of the higher point thresholds are still difficult to achieve in order to receive a ranking of ‘The Greatest’.

Pros:

• Good controls
• Level design was intricate/fun

• Main game mode has good replayability Cons:

• Even for 2007, graphics weren’t great

• Multiplayer is pretty basic – not a lot of new design