Video Game / Pure (2008)

Rise above.

Pure is an off-road Racing Game developed by Black Rock Studio and published by Disney Interactive Studios. The general idea is as such: Take the trick-based gameplay of SSX and the arcade-style off-road racing of MotorStorm, put 'em in a blender, and this game would be the resulting puree.

In this game, you'll speed through tracks all around the world and pull off huge stunts while facing off against skilled opponents, all in an attempt to get crowned the winner of an ATV racing competition known as the Pure World Tour. The game's main unique feature is its deep level of vehicle customization and tuning. You get to pick out every single part that makes up your ATV, from performance parts such as the engine, shocks, and boost canisters, to cosmetic tweaks such as the body, nosecone and fenders, with many of those parts having paint and sticker options as well - you even get to name it!

The game features three main game modes:

• Race is... well, a race. You have three laps to build up your Thrill Bar by pulling off tricks to get boost you can use to overtake your opponents.
• Sprint is a similar mode to Race, the core difference being that these events take place on short tracks with less jumps, requiring to focus on your racing lines and use whatever boost you can get to the fullest.
• Freestyle is all about the tricks. You have a time limit in the form your ATV's gas tank. During the time you have, land tricks and pull off combos to score as many points as you can. There are power ups on the track that can assist you with things such as a temporarily freezing your gas depletion, doubling your total point combo, giving you a substantial chunk of Thrill Bar juice, or immediately unlocking your Special Trick.

The game was released on September 19th, 2008 for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and Windows PC to a warm critical response. Since then, the game has become rather forgotten, though well remembered by those who did get to play it.

Tropes:

• Ability Required to Proceed: You need to use an ATV with a specific engine class to even participate in specific groups of World Tour stages. Thankfully, you will always unlock the next engine class when you complete the last stage that you can use your current one in.
• And Your Reward Is Clothes: Winning every event in specific World Tour stages unlocks an alternate outfit for one of the playable characters.
• Awesomeness Meter: The aptly-named Thrill Bar, which is built up by doing tricks, allows you to access cooler ones as it it filled, with it also doubling as a boost meter.
• Character Customization: Technically present, but very limited. All you get is a choice between a few preset outfits and helmet colors.
• Difficult, but Awesome: The higher tiers of tricks take longer to complete, and as a result are harder to land without crashing, but look cooler than the basic tricks and bag you more Thrill Bar energy and points (if playing in Freestyle). Taken to an extreme with Special Tricks, which require your entire Thrill Bar to be filled to be even so much as accessible, and have very long animations, but look awesome and refill almost your entire Thrill Bar if landed.
• Don't Try This at Home: Every time you turn the game on, one of the splash screens makes it abundantly clear that this is a work of fiction, and that you should not be stupid enough to try these ridiculous stunts in the real world.
• Level in Reverse: Any Sprint track can be played in reverse by pressing a button on the course selection screen.
• Limit Break: Special Tricks, which are only made available to you if you can completely max out your Thrill Bar.
• Marathon Level: Ghost Creek is very long in comparision to the other tracks; even a relatively fast lap can take you a full two minutes to complete.
• Market-Based Title: The game's title was changed to Extreme Racing: Pure for the Japanese release.
• Multi-Platform: The game was released simultaneously on every non-handheld platform of its time (well, everything not made by Nintendo, anyway), seeing versions on the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and PC. There was also a Java cell phone game based off of it, but it plays nothing like the console game and is more of a promotional companion to it.
• Nintendo Hard: You're in for a rude awakening if you go into this game assuming it will be easy. The CPU racers quickly become very difficult to defeat as you win more races, with the game never letting up and always becoming harder with each completed stage. And if that wasn't enough for you, there is also some absolutely nutty Rubberband AI in play here, making every single crash a potential run-killer in later parts of the game. Expect copious amounts of restarts.
• Nitro Boost: You can use the Thrill Bar energy you've earned by tricking to power a speed boost.
• One-Word Title: A very common word in the English language, no less. Have fun trying to look this game up online without adding extra words to your search term.
• Palmtree Panic: Kosa Phi Island takes place in a tropical area.
• Product Placement: The various parts you can use for your ATV are manufactured by real-world motorsport brands that sell such products, such as Maxxis, Yoshimura and AIRFOX. The World Tour stages are even named after them.
• Racing Game: Off-road trick racing, to be more specific.
• Rubberband AI: With a vengeance. It does not take long at all for your CPU opponents in World Tour to inexplicably be able to keep up with you even after you take shortcuts and boost whenever you can.
• Rule of Cool: Can you do a huge, spinny-flip on an ATV in Real Life? No. Can you do it anyway in this game? Yes. Does anyone care about how unrealistic this all is? No, because it's awesome
• Scenery Porn: The game's tracks look beautiful, even a decade and a half after its launch.
• Secret Character: Completing World Tour lets you play as Bret Taylor, who the game says is the best ATV racer in the world.
• Shifting Sand Land: A handful of tracks take place in deserts. Glamis and Ghost Creek are both good examples.
• Slippy-Slidey Ice World: Downplayed. Kiwi Glacier does feature some snow, but the track is still mostly comprised of forested landscapes.
• Time Attack: You can set up endless Race and Sprint events without CPU racers that let you try for the fastest possible lap.
• World Tour: All of the tracks take place in various different locations around the world, such as Italy, Thailand and California. Take a guess what the single-player campaign is called.