When I think back to some of the memorable games I've played over the past 20 years they tend to fall into a number of different categories based on what stood out about them the most. There's the big budget AAA titles such as Halo 2, Ghost Recon 2, DRIV3R but yeah, some of these are remembered for perhaps the wrong reasons. Then there's the games that don't get the same exposure as others but stick in the mind simply due to the high amount of sheer fun that you had playing them. Games like LaserSquad on my Commodore 64, Rock n Roll racing on the SNES, Carmageddon for P.C and Deathrow for the Xbox make hanging onto your older systems sometimes worthwhile as many of them fade into history never to be made again.

187 Ride or Die may not be an original concept and while it looks, plays and feels like a meld of a number of different games that we've all played it is a load of fun and at its price of less than $50 one of the best budget game buys of the year so far. The idea is simple, get a bunch of guys, throw them in some fast cars, give the player access to loads of weapons and then race around blasting the crap out of each other. Simple idea and lucky for us all it's executed extremely well too. The controls are tight and everything from the graphics to the great multiplayer options all come together much better than what I was expecting and create a game worthy of adding to the 'hang onto' side of your game drawer.

You take control of the games main character, Buck who through a personal debt finds himself working for the local crime kingpin Dupree who is in the middle of a turf war with the evil Cortez. Well, both of them are evil I guess but Buck is forced to pick sides and throughout the games cut scenes you become aware that he's not really in it for the love, but bound by the debt that Dupree won't release him from. Yes, amongst all the high speed carnage there is a story trying to be told but the cut scenes, while cool, don't really tell the story amazingly and without ruining the game, the final cut scene just reinforces that feeling by being kind of vague and not really giving any real sense of closure. But enough of that, we're not here for a love story filled with fluffy toys we're here to race!

While there is plenty of shooting 187 Ride or Die is mostly about the racing and to reinforce that the levels are pretty linear with a few shortcuts to be found but none of the free roaming giant maps seen in games such as Midnight Club 2. The tracks take place through cities at night, freeways, massive storm water drains (much like the ones featured in the Terminator 2 truck chase scene) and there's also a few 'arena' style levels thrown in as well. The races feature goals such as not to be in last place at the end of each lap, simply finish first, escape from a car park or your available weapons might be restricted just to land mines. There isn't a large amount of variety in the race types but they are broken up from time to time with an arena type level where the sole aim is to just blow away as many other cars as you can. These levels require you to employ a bit of strategy as well as the A.I is quite evasive and health packs are available but sometimes hard to find as your opponents can pick also pick them up.

The weapons in the game consist of your standard pistol that you start off with but basically it's a pea shooter only good for making dents in your opponent's panels. You'll quickly want to pick up a magnum, a mine, sub machine gun, AK47, shotgun or later on, assault rifle and even the occasional rocket launcher. Though these are quite hard to find and throughout the whole game I only managed to find a single one towards the end. To pick up weapons you simply drive through the bullet icons and as you can carry two at any one time you can switch between them by pressing the 'Y' button. The controls are quite easy to master and pressing 'B' lets you fire forwards, 'X' lets you fire backwards and by holding in the 'L' analogue stick you can switch to the rear view to spray lead at those behind you. A sort of 'auto pilot' kicks in when you do this and it really helps as looking backwards, shooting, while trying to drive would be pretty hazardous to your health!

The weapon count is fairly generous but while you can have say, two pistols in your arsenal you can't dual wield them which I thought you would be able to do as all those mad gangstas seem to like going akimbo wherever possible. The standard control scheme has a slight auto aim but you have to line up your opponents properly to increase your accuracy. For a harder challenge the advanced controls feature manual aiming with the right analogue stick, it's trickier but allows you to land a lot more damage and to also target fuel barrels that can be found around some parts of the tracks. When you corner you can also skid to build up your boost meter that can be used at any time, or if you wait until it fills up, allows a massive speed boost that's extremely useful on the straights and while none of these are particularly new concepts they are handled pretty damn well. You're never fighting the controls and as the action comes thick and fast as long as your own reflexes are up to the challenge there are plenty of great moments and loads of action to be enjoyed. Pump enough lead into your opponents and you get treated to a Burnout 3 style 'takedown' effect that shows their car exploding apart into pieces in a nice little slow motion scene. Yep, nothing new but it's done pretty well and a good reward.

The graphics in 187 Ride or Die are colourful, the tracks look great and there's also a cool blur effect used to help accentuate the feeling of speed. Everything is very detailed and the texture work in the game is better than I was expecting. The levels are well designed and feature good variety between the different tracks that the action takes place in. The cars look great too and as you progress more are unlocked that feature more armour, are faster and also handle better. For flat out racing the sports cars are available but in the arena levels some souped up SUV's can be used that feature a nice mini gun attached to them. None of the cars feature real model names but they still look great and feature some great design elements.

For a budget game Ubisoft have done a great job with the production values as everything looks great, moves at a high framerate and also features excellent sound effects. The games music is your typical 'love or hate it' but of course the option is always there to turn it down as the sound of gun shots and squealing tires can sometimes be easier on the ears than some of the rap tunes featured. It must be mentioned that the camera angles that you can choose from are actually great, while some games are happy to give you two useless 'bumper cams' and one behind the car view, 187 Ride or Die also has a cool 'over the shoulder' view that should be in all high speed racing games where you have to dodge traffic at insane speeds.

If you get sick of blasting the streets apart by yourself 187 Ride or Die features a cool split screen co-operative mode. You can drive while a mate blasts away (or of course vice versa) or go head to head via system link. Xbox Live is also supported and 8 people can go online to fight it out in the games cool online modes. For less than $50 there's little excuse for your mates to grab a copy and I can see this game eating up loads of Xbox Live time as there is a real shortage of games like this and none with online play.