There is plenty to be happy about; there is definitely a lot of content on offer in Moto GP 06. The game covers both the 2005 and the current 2006 seasons, allowing the player to experience the different bikes and riders who actually don the leathers. The seventeen Moto GP tracks are the same, but are raced in a different order and in addition to these are the sixteen Extreme Racing circuits, all of which are street-based. Rather than using the official race bikes, there are several 600, 1000 and 1200cc bikes available to purchase and to use across these three additional championships.

Despite this vast array of subject matter, the Moto GP series is really starting to look tired: very little has been added to this release; it’s the same old stuff from the previous games (time trial, quick race and career mode), and these all work similarly. For the time trials and quick races, the number of available circuits is initially limited until progress is made through the career mode. For each circuit there are two challenges, giving a reward of a skill point to increase proficiency at cornering, braking, top speed or acceleration. Quick lap times in time trial remain the same unlocking reversed, mirrored and reverse-mirrored tracks.

One minor difference is the rider seeding. Starting at a hundred, the figure drops when other riders with a better seed are defeated, both on- and offline. This ultimately leads to bike, rider and circuit unlocks, and is also related to a number of Xbox Live achievements.

The penalty for going off the circuit remains and is still as badly implemented as it ever was. The feature was introduced to stop riders taking shortcuts when playing online, which is a noble aim, but it desperately needs fixing. In real GP racing a rider will be punished with a stop-go penalty if a short cut gives an advantage, here time is simply added for being in the gravel regardless of whether it gives an advantage or not. It is perfectly possible to take short cuts still, as long as these are made of tarmac.

An underlying impression, and one that is difficult to shake, is the feeling that the game is somewhat unfinished: where previously rider and bike animation was quite superb, seeing chain and suspension components working properly, inexplicably, the front sprocket and chain doesn’t move at all in the latest version. Perhaps more disappointing are the quite severe issues with framerate and screen tearing, especially when running in High Definition resolutions. This also gets worse when playing online with up to sixteen other riders, one of the series' strongest selling points.

Unfortunately this is not the worst problem. Looking at the friends listing of circuit times locks the console, even in time trial mode. It is unforgivable that such an obvious crash bug requiring a hard reset of the console slipped through QA, especially given this is very easy to do by accident.

More bizarre is once the Extreme tracks are unlocked (done by completing a Moto GP championship), the game becomes more playable. In this mode there is less screen tearing, there is less slowdown, the bikes sound better: it’s almost as if it’s a different game. Perhaps this is down to less bikes being on the track; maybe the physics have been simplified a little. It’s difficult to believe it’s a track issue, given these look very lush and are filled with more detail than the Moto GP circuits ( which have lots of run-off space and a couple of grandstands ).

What made Moto GP great, and thankfully remains, is the degree of control the player has over the motorcycles; it is still as sublime as it ever was. To control the rider’s position on the bike, the left stick is used, to control acceleration and braking, the right stick is used. For the advanced gamer, the superbly executed separate front/rear braking system controlled with the right and left triggers is present and correct. It is how bikes properly work and well worth the time to learn to use.

The AI clearly has no issue riding its bikes, albeit rather slowly at novice level. Here starting from the back of the grid isn’t a problem, and by turn two, chances are the player will be race leader. Not so once the grid is set to the higher difficulty modes. The computer will play harder and ride faster, making learning the circuits and putting in decent qualifying laps essential. There is definitely fun to be had if the glitches of this game are ignored, but this is a hard thing to do.

Where Namco has managed to evolve Moto GP on the PS2 over time, by bringing more aspects of real racing such as 125cc and 250cc classes, Climax has stagnated. It’s sad, but it has also brought with it a stack of problems on Xbox 360; Microsoft’s ride has fallen and DNF. Underneath there is a decent racer trying to get out, however, the missed opportunities to tweak the game, the awful screen tearing and framerate problems and the crash bug mar the experience to some degree. Until a patch is released to fix this unfinished game, think carefully before making that purchase.