Live Summit - Mazda Strip [Let's Play Games #2]

Last Saturday I made a post about how it feels when the video games with races between cars turn into reality and you wake up walking between tens of historical cars and have the rally cars crossing the street next to your camping base with their engines howling to the moon, but never really talked about the games with cars I enjoy playing.

Without any doubts, my favourite series and also the one I grew up with, is Need For Speed. Actually, the single game missing from the series is Need for Speed™ Heat which looks like the whole action was taken to the next level and I can't wait giving it a try one day.

However, along with the NFS series, I had a period when I used to love playing Dirt Rally and the other games of the Dirt series, until I received The Crew as a gift from a friend. I finished playing the main story of the game in around 3 days and the ending even brought some tears in my eyes. I remember how curious I was waiting to see if a new one will come out, because everything seemed like it should have a continuation into a future game, but then, just 4 years later, The Crew 2 was released.

I didn't wait too much for it and bought it on the first sale and began playing it with my boyfriend. Unfortunately, The Crew 2 came as a big disappointment for many who loved the first one and the story behind of it while the 2nd game brought a lot of new vehicles, such as airplanes, boats, helicopters, enduro bikes, and many more that ended with no less than 15 different disciplines, each of them having its own required vehicles, missions and rules.

It's true that the handling of the vehicles is not the best, and it has nothing to do with that from the NFS series which is pretty accurate, but it's just a matter of time and if you really loved the first The Crew, I'm sure you will end up playing the 2nd one as well.

Personally, I use an old XBOX controller which works great during the races, no matter if they are on the ground, on the water, or in the air.
I tried to play from both the keyboard and a Logitech G920 steering wheel, and none of them felt better than the controller does, which in the end, is the most recommended for this type of games.
Since I bought the game, both I and my boyfriend played all the missions and tournaments until the developers began adding all kind of events and seasons to the game, just for the sake of keeping their players with them.
Which is not a bad thing, because it felt quite repetitive after I finished all the races and there was not too much to do and explore in the game, but as soon as they added the hobbies section and the seasons, you will find daily what to do in the game, even if just for a few minutes.
A few days ago I finished completing the season and I'm waiting for the new one to be released in 28 days from now on, so these days I open up the game just every Wednesday when a new Live Summit is released.
The Live Summits are weekly online events, which are different from a week to another, containing a total of 9 races that can be completed. Depending on your speed and performances finish a race, you score some points that are gathered together and then you will be ranked in a top with all the players from the game who played the event.

Before a new Live Summit is released, you will get some drops based on your performances which can come in different forms, from followers (which represent the EXP needed to level up), to vehicles parts and different tunning accessories to make your favourite car shinier.

The Live Summit released today will run from 6th to 13th October and once this period ends, you won't be able to return to it and play again because a new one will be released and take its place. What I love about these weekly events is that it trains me on all 15 disciplines while I do well on just a few of them, and in plus, it makes me enlarge my collection of vehicles from the game, being needed to purchase some which are missing for the races.

Along with the weekly events released, there are two type of races - the ones which have no restriction and these which are very specific and force you to play with a specific vehicle, the latter situation being the one in which case you have to purchase that vehicle if you don't already own it or if it's not loaned in the game. Comparing The Crew 2 with CS:GO, over here everything you purchase is done exclusively with the money from the game and these can't be sold for real money as it happens with the skins from Counter-Strike: Global Offensive.

Even though we are talking about two multiplayer and online games, the type of the game is not the single one different (Shooter vs. Racing), but also the way you get to take advantage of these customizable skins for both your character and cars/guns.

Back when I was playing CS 1.6 there was nothing like skins or be able to customize in any way your character, but as soon as CS:GO was released and the developers noticed how many people are playing it and are willing to invest real money into a game, they started releasing all kind of skins, from those used for the guns to those for the character, knives, or even tattoos and stickers for the weapons. You might think who is that crazy to pay an amount of money for something virtual which is just in a game, but you will be surprised how much some skins costs and that there are people who are purchasing skins for thousands of euros every second.

Anyway, back to The Crew 2 and the new races in the Live Summit of this week called Mazda Strip.
The summit comes with a total of 9 races from which 4 have the restriction to use a Mazda Car during the race:

1. Escape - where you have to drive at least 1,100 meters away from the start on the water in order to complete the race. [No Restriction Race]
2. Buoy Smashing - it comes with some floating objects on the water that you must hit in order to collect points and score at least 4,210 points to qualify further. [No Restriction Race]
3. Speedtrap - it's not actually a race, but a point on the map where you have to pass with a car or bike with a speed of at least 200 km/h in order to be completed. [No Restriction Race]
4. Hypercar - represents the category with some of the most expensive and fast cars from the game, with brands like Lamborghini, Bugatti, Ferrari and so on. You need to finish on one of the first 3 places to win the race. [No Restriction Race]
5. Drag - it's similar to the Speedtrap race but where you have a longer period to cross the finish line with a big speed gained faster than 15,5 seconds. [No Restriction Race]
6. Drift - as it name suggests, you have to do as many drifts as possible to score at least 15,000 points and qualify further. [Mazda RX7 required]
7. Rally Raid - it's an off-road race where you have to cross the finish line on the 1st place. [Mazda MX-5 Miata Na required]
8. Street - is the category with the most common races in this type of games, where you race against other players or the computer to finish amongst the top three to have the mission completed. [Specific Car Offered In-Game - no need to own or purchase it]
9. Touring - last but not least, this race is usually held on circuits, but this time is held on the streets of Las Vegas and you must cross the finish line faster than 2:43 minutes. [Mazda MX-5 required]

Personally, I had to purchase two vehicles which I wasn't owning yet, but the single one that I could afford was the one in the 9th race, while for the other one I'll have to replay some more in-game races to earn more bucks for it.

Since I've never been a fan of the Drift races because I love speed and this doesn't help you in this kind of races, that run seemed the most challenging for me, because the more you link together drifts a bigger bonus you will receive but every time you hit the walls or any object from the street, your bonus will disappear and that comes with lots of points being lost. Along with the races I really love and consider myself being good at, the Hypercar and Street races seemed the most fun even if these are not where I scored the best points, haha.

Level: 1559
Completion races: 8/9
Races with a score over 100,000: 4/9
Currently placed in the summit: 1,541/689,305