Two islands in Test Drive Unlimited 2

By Tom Bramwell Published 12 May, 2010

Ibiza, Oahu, avatars, off-road racing, more.

Namco Bandai and Eden Studios have revealed that Test Drive Unlimited 2 takes place in Ibiza, but that at some stage you unlock the airport and get to fly to the Hawaiian island of Oahu from the first game.

The open-world racing game's due out for PC, PS3 and Xbox 360 this autumn.

Eurogamer contributor Christian Donlan - who is in Barcelona at Namco Bandai's ongoing press event seeing the publisher's 2010 line-up - reported that Oahu "has been filled with new roads and new challenges and missions - i.e. game is huge!"

Ibiza is huge as well, with off-road networks to complement the miles and miles asphalt, and you can now make progress in the game's career mode through a mixture of competitive racing, exploration, social activities and collecting stuff.

It all adds to your global levelling up, but Test Drive Unlimited 2 is still largely about completing challenges, earning money, and buying fancy motors in a huge open environment.

On the social side, you can now get out of your car, at which point you discover you have a customisable PlayStation Home-style avatar, so you can wander around your house, buy and tweak furniture and chill out here on the deck etc.

Online and offline blend together seamlessly, but online you can form your own racing clubs with friends, customise a clubhouse and take on other clubs to buy more impressive stuff for, er, your clubhouse and cars.

As you've probably observed in the trailer below, released yesterday, it's a much prettier game too. There's also procedural damage modelling, but it doesn't affect car physics, only visuals. The handling has also been refined so every car has its own personality.

Check back later for our in-depth impressions of Test Drive Unlimited 2.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000. Follow him on Twitter.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (21) Latest comment 2 years ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • woodnotes #1 2 years ago

    Do you get to run over the chavs in San Antonio?

  • secombe #2 2 years ago

    Superb - Ibiza has some incredible twisty roads (particuarly in the North) that I've always wanted to drive in something that isn't a 1.2 Rental Polo.

    Can't wait for this.

  • Bealsy #3 2 years ago

    jizz. in my pants.

  • Kill_Crazy #4 2 years ago

    You get exclusive club member only cars with the MP as well which sounds good. Avatar and social side doesn't interest me, personally, so i hope you don't have to do this to progress. The mrs can do that if need be :)

  • metalangel #5 2 years ago

    Ibiza, not Mallorca? Boo! Suppose it's easier for the devs to make a tiny island and recycle the old one. Here's to better avatars than the first game if there's so much more time spent with them.

  • zubnut #6 2 years ago

    Maybe atari have a crackpot alternative plan that could teach EA a thing or two about how to discourage the 2nd hand market:
    Simply put your entire first game into the sequel...

    This just jumped a few places on my likely to buty list too.

  • I\'mListening #7 2 years ago

    The one thing they have got to get right this time is to actually make it a racing game. The opposing AI was an absolute pushover. Still, I enjoyed driving around a virtual island - until my three year old son erased my game save (over 100 hours of play time!)

  • wizlon #8 2 years ago

    Never played the first one but this is sounding ace.

  • Haloboy #9 2 years ago

    Please for the love of all things holy make the friends option actually work this time. Trying to meet up with friends via the use of mental telepathy is bloody hard work.

  • SYS64738 #10 2 years ago

    Ibiza, Oahu? I wonder if you can tell the difference in the final game, wouldn't be surprised if the same engine assets are used for both locations. A bit more variety in terms of locations would've been nice.

    Regarding the comment about twisty roads on Ibiza - that's the only area (i.e. twisty roads!) where TD1 was definitely NOT fun due to the lacking feel of weight of the cars. Let's hope they'll improve that bit.

  • woodnotes #11 2 years ago

    TDU1 was a long time ago, so I'm expecting significant improvements for this.

  • Anthony_UK #12 2 years ago

    Decent handling please and yes let the friends option actually work this time...

  • Grump #13 2 years ago

    I wonder how far are we from having the technology to do something like Test Drive: Australia?

  • Spekingur #14 2 years ago

    @#6
    Haha, zubnut, to booty list ^__^

    The first game looked awesome. I'm hoping for more of the same.
    @Grump: Have you seen the game Fuel? The area you drive in is HUGE! Takes hours to drive from one corner to the other. So getting closer and closer is my guess :D
    Would have loved seeing that engine (and land area) in a role-playing game, though.

  • gnrlstuart #15 2 years ago

    noicce! can i kill chavvy clubbers?

  • Slipstream #16 2 years ago

    Nathan Drake confirmed 0:35 seconds in, partying it up at Ibiza!

    TD2 is looking positivley lush, I'm keen to see other than the new islands, what gameplay additions they've added. Size isn't everything.

  • estoo #17 2 years ago

    Pretty sure we were discussing this in the main game thread over 2 weeks ago, not really "news".

    Can't wait for this game all the same.

  • SYS64738 #18 2 years ago

    "Size isn't everything."

    Yes it is.

  • Swap.avi #19 2 years ago

    Tdu was a fantastic game for online but its single player was pretty worthless.The other problem with the game was that it lacked dedicated servers you'd have hundreds of cars at the Strip or the lighthouse but the most you could actually see was 7. Of course the ps3 game won't have this problem but psn has its own drawbacks.Still the best part is just cruising around with your friends.
    Edited by Swap.avi at 12/05/10 @ 12:04

  • TruWari3r #20 2 years ago

    Well in the first tdu the driving was fun, the mp interesting and just enough cars to keep it interesting.


    The avatar bit however, I wish they would just remove that feature as it really sucked in the first part. Also a few of the side missions too repetitive (with the "hitchhiker" thing for instance).


    Fun game, will definitely take a look when it comes out.
    Edited by TruWari3r at 12/05/10 @ 11:27

  • carrotcake #21 2 years ago

    Hope it's as relaxing to simply cruise around as the first game was. Lovely change of pace from the annoying stuff I've been playing, I want this!