Aftertouchdown!

One of the essential new gameplay features in Burnout® 3: Takedown™ is Aftertouch, the ability to affect your car’s direction after you’ve crashed and lost control. Invoking Aftertouch puts you in a slow-motion view of the wreck, allowing you time to see if there’s anything worth crashing into nearby and giving you the opportunity to veer toward it.

Your wheels may be gone, but in this game, that doesn’t mean you can’t steer. Here’s how to fully exploit this powerful addition to the game.

You ain’t dead yet.

Aftertouch is simple to grasp, but difficult to master. All you need to do to invoke it is press the A button after a crash and make contact with your target. You can’t completely negate your momentum—if you’re moving left at full speed, you won’t be able to do a 180 and move right—but you can alter your course enough to totally change the outcome of your situation.

Use the Momentum

You can use Aftertouch after crashes, off-ramp dives, and car explosions, thanks to Crashbreaker.

Although Aftertouch gives you a little control, you still have to be alert and nimble-fingered to make the most of it. You’ve got to train your eyes, ears, and brain to spot Aftertouch opportunities in any situation … because you’ll be using it extensively in both races and Crash mode.

The trick is to know—at all times—where you are in relation to your opponents, bonus icons, and the environmental features that can block your progress (like concrete highway dividers). You can’t simply coast through obstacles like trees, lamp posts, or other vehicles, but you can get around them or over them if you have the momentum.

It’s always useful for gaining a few more Crash points (simply slide into the biggest and most expensive innocent bystander vehicle you can reach), but the real beauty of Aftertouch is its strategic uses.

Get ready to fly.

When competing against other drivers (people or A.I.) in any of Burnout 3: Takedown’s race modes, Aftertouch can make the difference between a gold medal and the bottom of the barrel. Nothing drops your position in the field faster than a crash because it costs you boost as well as time.

Preserve the Boost

Luckily, while Aftertouch allows you to throw yourself into your opponent’s way, to force them into a crash, doing so preserves a large portion of the boost you’ve accumulated—boost that would have been diminished by a normal crash. In a crowded section of road, you can take down three or even four other drivers after you’ve wiped out, preserving both your race position and your boost meter.

As the crash animation begins, anticipate where you think the other drivers are, hold down the button, and wait for the camera to give you a view you can use. Watch for incoming competitors, steer yourself into their path, and expect them to react to you as you go. They’ll try to avoid you every bit as hard as you’re trying to tag them.

Aftertouch strategy really comes into play during Crash mode. It used to be, if you missed the main intersection where all the cars were, you were out of luck. With Aftertouch, you can get well clear of most traffic and still slide into enough trouble and multiplier icons to earn the gold.

Chain your Opportunities

What you need to do is chain your Aftertouch opportunities together. In the Leap of Faith junction, for example, the opening fly-by doesn’t really tell you how you’re supposed to get under the overpass to all the scoring bonuses. If you Aftertouch off the ramp, guide yourself past the Heartbreaker through the bonus score icons, and then drop down in front of the oncoming semi trucks, they’ll smash you along the road like a hockey puck toward the 4X multiplier.

If you don’t make it on sheer momentum, use your Crashbreaker to launch yourself up and farther down the road to get the 4X multiplier. If that doesn’t get you there, aim for the Crashbreaker icon to blow up all over again. From there, it’s a short Aftertouch journey to the green marker and the big dollar values.

Now that’s chaos.

The idea is to identify our targets (be it scoring icons or enemy drivers) and then Aftertouch your way to them. In Crash mode, you can extend your Aftertouch by using every available opportunity. Ramps, Crashbreaker icons, the Crashbreaker threshold, and the initial crash itself will all activate the slow-motion camera.

Burnout 3: Takedown encourages quite a few strange driving habits, but none is stranger—or more effective—than continuing to steer when your wheels aren’t even touching the ground.

Article by Wendell Scott