Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown Season 3 review: Slowly returning to form

Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown’s launch last September went as well as the start of the 1998 Belgian Grand Prix.

After years of anticipation, persistent server problems, an unnecessary online connection requirement and KT Racing’s poorly judged compensation ruined Test Drive Unlimited’s reputation. But it’s not the end of the road yet.

The miraculous redemptions of No Man’s Sky and Cyberpunk 2077 show that recovering from a botched launch is difficult but possible, and KT Racing is determined to redeem Solar Crown after its rocky start.  

Six months after the disastrous launch, Season 3 is Solar Crown’s most pivotal update yet. It follows last year’s Season 2 update, which saw players return to Test Drive Unlimited 2’s Ibiza Town.

Originally, Season 3 was set to introduce a new Clan Warfare mode. Wisely, KT has delayed it to prioritise adding community-requested features. Season 3 is the result of this course correction.

Special delivery

Season 3’s main highlight is the return of car delivery missions, called Convoys. A throwback to the original Test Drive Unlimited games, these challenges task you with driving a prestigious car to a demanding client without damaging it. If you played the original Test Drive Unlimited games, these missions are almost exactly as you remember them, with a few added flourishes.

This time, a percentage meter indicates the car’s condition, starting at 100% and decreasing whenever you dent it. The higher the percentage when you complete a delivery, the better the reward you get.

Delivering a car in pristine condition isn’t easy. You feel the tension, knowing that nudging a traffic car, clipping a cone or grazing the grass will incur harsh penalties depending on the client’s tolerance. There’s no time limit or bonus for faster deliveries, so it pays to drive carefully even when it’s tempting to floor it.

Excessive damage will fail the mission, with no option to repeat it until it reappears on rotation. If the client is satisfied, delivery missions are an effective way of earning money, with higher payouts than standard races.

Compared to Test Drive Unlimited 2, where you pick up cars from random characters without explanation, Solar Crown’s delivery missions attempt to add some context. Each of the 30+ missions (only three appear on the map at a time, and some are rarer than others) has a unique character and backstory.

Paranoid they’re being watched, one character asks you to be their decoy by driving their flashy Ferrari 812 Superfast. Another scenario sees you deliver a Porsche 911 R to a football stadium because a goalkeeper blew their engine.

It’s a shame these narratives aren’t explored further in the brief cut scenes, complete with cheesy dialogue and PS3-era character models. That would usually be a criticism, but in this case, it’s part of Test Drive Unlimited’s janky charm.

With dealership test drives limited to 60 seconds, convoy missions make it easier to drive the desirable cars you can’t afford, from the Ferrari 488 Pista to the Lamborghini Aventador SVJ and Lancia Stratos.

Alongside the car delivery missions is a new navigation mode with over 25 events across Hong Kong Island and Ibiza. These events remove the on-screen GPS route, challenging you to reach a destination as fast as possible using a compass for directions. Navigation events are more difficult than traditional time trials, testing your navigation skills and map knowledge to find the fastest route.  

With only races and time trials available before, Solar Crown’s single-player campaign quickly became repetitive. The limited number of events also forced you to repeat races and grind for credits and XP until you reached the next reputation level. These new activities help alleviate this, giving you more to do and other ways to earn money.

Thanks to these new modes, Solar Crown is finally starting to feel like a Test Drive Unlimited game.

New wheels

Season 3 introduces three new cars: the Ferrari LaFerrari Aperta convertible, DeLorean DMC-12 and Aston Martin Valour. These are worthy additions, but frustratingly unobtainable.

With the paid Solar Pass tier delayed, the LaFerrari is a free reward. Simply claim the Solar Pass, and the 963-hp Italian supercar will be instantly added to your collection. There’s a catch, though: you can’t access it until you reach reputation level 50, which is no easy feat. For context, I’ve reached level 26 after around 50 hours of playtime.   

Meanwhile, the DeLorean is a level 25 Solar Pass reward, requiring too many hours of grinding to unlock. Finally, the Aston Martin Valour is a ranked reward, so it won’t be accessible until the season ends in a few months. Test Drive Unlimited has always been about grinding and working for your cars, but it feels excessive in Solar Crown and doesn’t value your time.

Car customisation has also been expanded with new rim designs and custom license plates, allowing you to add coloured backgrounds or change the text. However, you can’t add your own text, presumably to stop you from adding naughty words. Some are eye-wateringly expensive: a gold-trimmed license plate will set you back a whopping 350,000 credits. Erm, no thanks.

Solo Crown

Solo mode is another long-requested addition, allowing you to jump straight into a race with AI opponents instead of forcing you to wait in PVP multiplayer lobbies. Mercifully, you can also now pause the game and restart mid-race. Frankly, these fundamental features should have been included at launch, not six months later. 

While solo mode is a welcome addition, it’s not a proper offline mode: you still need an online connection to access the game and start events. Yes, even in solo mode. As a result, it doesn’t prevent the game from becoming inaccessible if the servers go down. At least the servers were reliable during our playthrough.

Last year, KT Racing told Traxion it was working on a solution to make the game playable if the servers are permanently shut down, but it’s still unclear if an offline mode will be implemented in the meantime.  

AI opponent difficulty can also now be tweaked from novice to expert, with higher levels offering better rewards. This helps balance the racing, as AI opponents were sometimes overpowered before.

Still a long road ahead

Season 3 is another step in the right direction. The car delivery missions recapture the spirit of classic Test Drive Unlimited games, there’s more event variety and the quality-of-life changes bring some much-needed improvements. However, it doesn’t solve Solar Crown’s most pertinent problems.

Six months on, we’re still experiencing frame-rate hiccups on PS5 in performance mode, particularly in the rain, and the graphics still look last-gen. Graphical improvements are planned, but not until later this year in Season 5.

New cars are extortionate to buy, yet race payouts are too stingy, making it painfully slow to progress. Crucially, lifestyle elements, a core part of Test Drive Unlimited’s DNA, are still absent. Even after multiple delays, Solar Crown still feels unfinished and probably should have been delayed another year.

Despite the rough start, KT Racing is working on several major updates. Looking ahead, Season 4 will introduce the casino in a few months. Real estate properties, by far Solar Crown’s most requested feature, are also planned sometime in year two.

It will be a long road to redemption, then, but KT Racing is clearly committed. Recently, the French studio even hired YouTuber and Test Drive Unlimited superfan Alex VII as a community manager to help shape the path ahead.  

Much like No Man’s Sky and Cyberpunk 2077, Solar Crown could be saved in time. But with Forza Horizon 5 about to give Nacon’s open-world racer some fierce competition on PlayStation 5, which is the most popular platform, time isn’t on Solar Crown’s side. Let’s hope it isn’t the final nail in Solar Crown’s coffin when there’s so much untapped potential.

Are you enjoying Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown’s Season 3 update, or is it too little too late? Let us know in the comments below. You can also watch our TDU1 retrospective on YouTube.