Jonny explains why Burnout 3 is on fire.

Burnout 3 is the best racing game ever. There I said it. While I'm not going to say it's the greatest game ever made - it's not - I'll also put it to you that you've simply never played anything this exciting. In terms of the pure thrill it delivers and the adrenaline it releases into your system, nothing else has ever come close.

Burnout 3 is all about risk vs reward. The more dangerous your driving - the faster you can go. So as you race, you earn boost for driving into oncoming traffic, by avoiding traffic by the narrowest of margins, by tailgating, jumping, ramming your opponents and skidding around corners. Risk too much and you'll crash, lose a few seconds and be in danger of not winning the race. Don't risk enough and you won't get that magic boost you're going to need to win. So you really need to get the balance right and know the limits of your abilities - and then push those limits - to get the most out of it.

Most of this will already be familiar to you if you've played Burnout 2. The main difference relates to the "Takedown" of the title - this time the driving is more aggressive, and the aim is to destroy your opponents as much as it is to beat them. This is achieved by shunting them into trees, walls, or, you know, oncoming buses, as you scream past. Successful Takedowns increase the size of your boost bar, which shrinks if you are the one being taken down.

The takedown effect itself is one of videogaming's most sublime moments, ever. Cause an opponent to crash and the camera whips round to show their satisfying demise in slow motion, before settling back on the action. Racing purists will be pleased to know you can switch the effect off (though I can't imagine a situation where anyone would get bored of seeing it!), while the main worry - that a couple of seconds with your attention away from your car could leave you steering straight into a truck, is dealt with by a short burst of invulnerability.

While crashing, or being taken down, is obviously the last thing you want to do if you consider winning important - it's also the main thing that makes Burnout 3 so great. For some reason it doesn't seem grizzly either. Obviously car crashes aren't nice, but there is a guilty visceral thrill in indulging in the destruction on offer here - the same way you enjoyed seeing American cities destroyed in Independence Day or The Day After Tomorrow. And sometimes the destruction on offer here can be pretty much that epic!

Also worth bearing in mind is that crashes do not end the violent fun - you can slow the game to a crawl once you crash and decide which way the wreck slides, meaning you can score "Aftertouch Takedowns" by slamming it into opponents as they barrel past.

Crash Mode - where you basically have to cause as much damage as you can at busy junctions - is back, and it's so accomplished and offers so much depth it almost could have come out as a separate game. Lorries now spill their payloads over the roads, causing even more cars and buses to pile up, oil tankers explode, and scattered icons offer points multipliers and even more explosions to the mix. Best of all is a new "Crashbreaker" function - once upwards of ten cars have been involved, you get the chance to trigger a huge bonus explosion - timing it right is crucial for maximum damage and it can also be used to fling your wreck towards icons you may have missed in your approach.

Other game modes beyond the standard race option include Road Rage (Take down as many opponents as possible before you either a) total your car or b) run out of time) Eliminator (the last car in each lap is eliminated from the race) and Face Off (simply beat your opponent to win his car) - all are excellent.

What's quite shocking is that Burnout 3 also seems to be the fastest racing game ever - it may seem daft to compare it speed-wise to, say, F-Zero GX or XGRA, (and how do you measure speed in a videogame anyway?) but in terms of how fast you seem to be travelling and the miniscule amount of reaction time you're usually afforded it leaves everything else in the dust

Thankfully it's also quite an easy game to play with simple, arcade-like controls. The cars are not difficult to steer, and it's mostly about your hands, eyes and brain operating together as one big unit with no lag between seeing and reacting. There is a knack to learning how to drift (whereby you hit the brakes and turn into a corner early to skid around it), but it is intuitive and highly rewarding once mastered.

After Acclaim published the previous two titles, Burnout 3 is for the first time brought to you by EA, who have added their own essence right through it and improved it no end. In a way it's almost like playing SSX Tricky (though for some reason it isn't an EA Sports BIG title - it certainly feels like it should have been) as colourful pinball-like scores, bonuses and congratulatory messages are flung up on screen for just about any type of action you can think of. It's certainly a game that knows how to reward the player, as faster and more outrageous vehicles are constantly unlocked for performing well in events.

Online is supported on both Xbox and PS2 versions, and it promises to be quite possibly the best online experience available today - if you have broadband in the house but haven't got your console online yet now is certainly the time.

One of the most incredible things about the game is the quality of the graphics - they are probably the best graphics in a racing game to date and right up there with the best of console gaming right now - which is kind of stupid of the developers, considering that the game moves so darn fast there's never any time to appreciate them! The cars, in relation to the damage effects in particular, look fantastic, but it wasn't necessary for the cities and other backdrops to be as detailed and vibrant as they are. In a time when corners are regularly cut to get games finished on time it's amazing to see that the developer Criterion has gone so far and above what we'd ever have asked of them.

Criticisms are extremely thin on the ground. EA's over-reliance on slightly crappy American college punk is starting to grate and I'm extremely thankful for the Xbox's ability to rip some decent rock and roll and create your own playlist (sorry PS2 owners, you're stuck with it) - though you don't seem able to save this preference in your profile and have to go back and change it every time you switch the console on. It's also annoying that they either omitted a replay mode or decided against it. Shocking, considering this is exactly the kind of game you want to watch and save replays for. Taking down four opponents in one go is the kind of once-in-a-lifetime moment you want to be able to relive and share with people, dammit!

Burnout 3 oozes quality from every single line of code, grabbing you immediately and refusing to let go. It's a masterclass in just how far it's possible to take one simple conceit, and as such it's a must whether driving games are your thing or not.