Part of Audi’s new advertising campaign for the 2009 A4 is developing a video game for the Apple iPhone and iPod Touch. What resulted was the Audi A4 Driving Challenge, a racing game featuring the A4 and using the iPhone’s built-in accelerometer to steer (turn it like a steering wheel, see below.)
Despite it being a free download, the game gathered quite a few negative reviews from users. This was mostly due to the game being a blatant advertisement, having very limited gameplay value, and terrible controls. I played the game myself, and the users were right. After about 5 minutes of play, I deleted the game from my iPhone and never looked back.
Fortunately, Audi realized that they’ll have to make a game worth downloading to gather the attention they seek, and just released a second version with better graphics, significantly improved handling (although very unrealistic,) more tracks to race, and the ability to unlock additional cars such as the A4 3.2L V6 and Audi R8.
This version is a significant improvement over the first, and is actually worth playing this time around. Let’s hope Audi continues to improve the game over time and makes it into a full-featured racing game for the iPhone.
In addition to the A4 Driving Experience, Audi created a website for the new A4 specifically developed for iPhone users. If you visit truthinengineering.com/a4/iphone from your iPhone, you’ll get a website which is supposed to be designed to fit iPhone browsers. In my experience, however, the site could use some more work.
Have you played the Audi A4 Driving Challenge? What do you think of the updated version?
Download Audi A4 Driving Challenge from iTunes
More pictures and screenshots:
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