Review: Top Gear: Where’s Stig? HD

We admit it. We’re Top Gear (BBC) junkies, and a small portion of every day is dedicated in search of an obscure episode or news fragment in some dusty corner of the Internet that’s related to the show. The App Store is yet another place to explore and, to date, we’ve found a total of 7 iPhone apps and 4 iPad apps hidden away in the midst of app clutter. Given that the show is from the UK, rather than a staple of American culture, the number of apps is commendable, covering everything from “Stigisms” (introductions to the Stig’s show segment) to show-inspired games.

Most everyone has, at one time or another, played word find games or seen a Where’s Waldo book — and now there are even iOS versions of these (see a list of these below). Top Gear: Where’s Stig is in the same vein but positively draws you in with sideline personalities, jokes, and snarky comments made over the history of the show by the three main hosts (Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, and James May – or as they are more commonly known Jezza, Hamster, and Captain Slow).

Before we address the game, allow us to fill you in on some of the off-season scuttlebutt related to Top Gear. If you’ve been living in a bunker and haven’t followed the show, the Stig is no more. He outed himself. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but his shtick was that you would never know who he was. It was a secret to be held like the existence of alien bodies stored at Area 51. This was one of the great allures of the Stig. Everyone wanted to be the Stig…the tame racing driver. He was a man of mystery. Too bad that Ben Collins felt the need to break his code of silence for the purposes of authoring a book (probably one that no fan will buy). While he’s had an interesting career, we enjoyed him far more as the Stig. Now he just plays the part of home wrecker to our favorite show. It hasn’t set well with the hosts of the show, either. Every new taping has some new barb thrown at the Stig for being a twit.

All the above said, we still have hope for a new Stig soon. Apparently they’re already selectively breeding a new tame race driver.

Update: The Top Gear Three Wise Men Christmas Special drops a bombshell. Be sure to watch it to find out!

Regardless of the status of the old Stig, it appears that the character will live on, so we’ll get back to the game…since it so highly features the Stig.

The game is like most, in that you can start out with a campaign (called Hot Pursuit) or training (Test Drive). We recommend jumping right into Hot Pursuit since, as you unlock additional maps, you can always go back and try to up your score.

Each map is a variation of a show-related theme. You start out on a Top Gear set and later travel to locations in Africa, Asia, America, the cold north of the Arctic, and outer space (we’re assuming as homage to the Reliant Robin Space Shuttle episode).

Once a map is selected you have to find, in the Where’s Waldo style of artwork, the three hosts, then a number of objects — and if you get all those, a number of bonus items. All the while a fuel gauge is used to denote how quickly your time is passing: the quicker your progress, the higher your score. As an added level of difficulty, about half way through the second set of objects, the Ghost of Black Stig creates some havoc for you. It may be that the screen is flipped upside down, it shakes, you can zoom in but the ghost Stig zooms you back out, or you have to search it using something similar to a spotlight. In any case, if you don’t identify where the ghost of the Stig is prior to his antics, prepare for a painful search! If you get stumped looking for an object or character all hope is not lost. You can always click the magic wand, then the item/character you are looking for, and the game will give you a hint. However, you won’t be allowed to use this hint tool again for a while, so use it judiciously!

One of the things we thought we thought would be of little value when we started playing was posting our game scores to OpenFeint, an in-game leader board system that allows you to share your score/rank with others playing the same game and map. After we played for a while and improved our scores, the challenge became to see how quickly we could work through each map and try to best the scores of others on the leader boards. This really brought a new dimension to the game and kept us coming back and playing it over and over again, thereby making the cost of the app definitely seem a bargain for the enjoyment we derived out of it.

When in Campaign mode, you can play through roughly a dozen maps as you unlock them. The only complaint we have is exactly what is supposed to happen when you unlock all the levels? Its kinda like climbing a mountain only to find there isn’t a view at the top and you are left looking around for what to do next.

Suggestion to the publishers – provide an update that will enable the user to make it through the campaign, which will unlock the option to do an in-app purchase of another full round of maps for say $1.99 or $2.99. We’ll buy!

Lack of direction at game conclusion aside, this is a stellar title and very worthy addition to the Top Gear iOS franchise. The production quality of the artwork, animation within the art, the soundtrack, and character and situational elements from the show make this an absolutely great title. Over the course of a couple of days, we played a lot more than than we initially expected. It’s just plain entertaining and challenging on so many levels.

If you haven’t watched any Top Gear episodes, the content will be lost on you. If, however, you’ve seen at least a couple of episodes and have some familiarity with the hosts, their exploits, and the tone of the show this will be a hit. We highly recommend this app, so go buy it, sit back, enjoy, and work your best high score for Tokyo, The Studio, Botswana, and other maps. You’ll see us listed in the leader boards, so we fully expect that if you can beat our scores you’ll come post a comment to this review letting us know. Bring it and let the smack talk begin!