For YMMV tropes relating to the Test Drive series in general, click here.
- Awesome Music: And how. Both Unlimited and Unlimited 2 have really memorable pieces; but the (solar) crown goes to Unlimited 2. Its music is just spot-on for the game's feeling. Here
are a few examples.- Trance music also gets its spotlight in Unlimited 2, where it fits like milk with cookies. Paul van Dyk's "For an Angel" is the best song in the whole game.
- Hell, there's even deadmau5 in the soundtrack of TDU2. Hello, "Ghosts n' Stuff".
- There's even Dubstep in the soundtrack! Ellie Goulding, "Under the Sheets (Jakwob Remix). IT ROCKS.
- TDUSC plans to be just as kickass in the music department as its predecessors, with Yuksek's "Fireworks" being featured in the teaser trailers.
- Trance music also gets its spotlight in Unlimited 2, where it fits like milk with cookies. Paul van Dyk's "For an Angel"
- Big-Lipped Alligator Moment: TDU2's opening cinematic isn't really followed up on or even alluded to after it happens.
- Contested Sequel: Test Drive Unlimited 2 split the fanbase into two: one part says that the game, being full of (sometimes helpful) glitches and with a hard-to-master driving system, is So Okay, It's Average; the other one says that its expansion on the Wide-Open Sandbox concept introduced in the first one makes it one of the most revolutionary racing games and an improvement over the original, and despite all the average reviews by game critics, it's fun and an unforgettable experience.
- Demonic Spiders: The Hawaiian police in TDU are an absolute nuisance, especially early in the game. They'll start chasing you down if you either hit their cruisers or traffic cars (twice is enough to increase your Wanted Meter). It gets worse if you reach the maximum level where they'll start spawning roadblocks that will cause your car to come to a full stop and instantly give you a hefty fine for your recklessness, making evading the police a massive chore. Their TDU2 counterparts take a step further as they'll start driving nothing but Dodge Vipers, send in the police chopper and use the EMP to cripple your car!
- Fan Nickname:
- Ever since the third Test Drive Unlimited game was revealed to have the rather lengthy title of Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown, it often gets shortened to simply Test Drive Unlimited 3 (TDU3).
- Fetish Retardant:
- The car washes in TDU2 are often regarded as being one of the worst parts of the game. What is meant to be seen as sexy and pleasurable for the player as three female models wash their car instead comes across as sleazy, misogynistic, and ill-fitting for the game. The increasingly outdated character models, the fact that in the case of certain cars, they'll miss them by a foot away (as YouTuber KuruHS mockingly remarked when using one of the car washes in a playthrough of TDU2, "Scrub that air!"), and the overuse of "Bang Bang Bang Bang" by Sohodolls doesn't help.
- Discovered footage revealed that the car wash cutscenes were originally conceived for TDU1 but ultimately went unused, possibly because it didn't fare any better. Though the women featured in the cutscene had more modesty than in the sequel, their models are much "copypasted" that stick out like a sore thumb, their faces are frozen into a permanent, horrific smiling and (much like the glich for certain cars in TDU2) their tools have no models whatsoever, to the point they appear to be interacting with the air like if they're hallucinating.
- First Installment Wins: The first Test Drive Unlimited has a far better vehicle handling model than its sequel; as a driving game, it is leagues above the sequel. Thanks to unofficial patches and other mods, 2 might be Vindicated by History now.
- Goddamned Bats: The traffic in TDU (in the 360 and PC versions) can fall into this, especially if you're driving a Group B or A car. The police, on the other hand, are far less tolerant.
- Good Bad Bugs: Test Drive Unlimited 2 has a particularly big one that's still unfixed (and because Eden Games was killed off by Atari, only to be revived as an independent studio who have since moved on to mobile and Nintendo Switch games, may never be fixed) where you can buy DLC vehicles (be it normally being locked or in offline mode where DLC isn't available) without any third-party tools. To do this, talk to the clerk to bring up the vehicles list then move the selection to an unlocked/non-DLC vehicle just above or below the desired DLC vehicle, press the A/X/Confirm button then just a split second after you hear the selection beep, try to move the selection to the desired DLC vehicle, the game will bring up the appearance options for the DLC car, acting as if you were buying an unlocked vehicle and will allow you to buy it. Just be warned when doing this online as that can and will trigger the anti-hack system, it's safer to do this in offline mode or when running the Unofficial Patch with the Universal Launcher.
- Most Wonderful Sound:
- The short fanfare when reaching F.R.I.M. Level 10 and the jingle of banking $10,000.
- Leveling up in 2 with that muscle car growl.
- Narm:
- The voice acting in Test Drive Unlimited 2 was not the game's selling point by any stretch and the story was very much an Excuse Plot.
- The European Spanish dub of 2 is perhaps even worse than the original regarding certain characters. One example is Miami Harris; while in the original she sounds like you'd expect a stereotypical heiress to sound, the European Spanish dub's idea of making her sound like an airhead apparently was to give her the most stilted line readings imaginable, making her sound like she was subjected to a lobotomy.
- Obvious Beta: TDU 2 suffered from a massive amount of bugs and server failures when it was released. The PC version of the game would oftentimes flat-out refuse to let players play due to server overload.
- Polished Port: The PlayStation 2 port of the first Test Drive Unlimited by Atari Melbourne House. While it's a visual downgrade compared to the PC and Xbox 360 versions as it omits several features such as Manual transmission, avatar customization, certain manufacturers like Ferrari (including all motorcycles) and even the hidden teleporter to the Eden Island (since the island cannot be accessed via normal means of gameplay in said port), but it adds some exclusive content in order to compensate the shortcomings such as additional radio stations (and exclusive licensed music), "Master Points" (which is the predecessor to TDU2's F.R.I.M. and the more points you have, the more cash you'll earn from events), "Quick Race" mode, single-player clubs (where you have to beat all members including their president and some will give you a prize car or upgrades for free of charge) and Auto GPS (which is useful as it will automatically lead you to a closest available race). Last but not least, beating the final event "Coastal Dream" will unlock every single garage that you haven't bought yet (especially if you have the tendency to collect every single car in-game). Overall, it's a pretty impressive port even by the said console's standards. The PlayStation Portable port is also quite impressive for handheld standards, but it also counts aside from having the cockpit view removed for some reason.
- Quicksand Box: Due to the fact that players can do anything from completing side-quests, buying cars, customizing their houses, finding wrecks, finding picture locations, and finding all of the roads in a world that has no invisible walls, many players quickly put off completing the main races.
- Sidetracked by the Gold Saucer: Be forewarned when unlocking the casino in the second game. You may spend more time on the betting mini-games than you will be driving your cool cars. The achievement name for winning the Audi R8 Spyder 5.2 FSI Quattro (be it via the specific Test Drive slot machine or grinding tokens) lampshades this with "Ready to Play Test Drive Unlimited 2?"
- That One Level:
- "The Millionaire's Challenge" from TDU1. It's a ~120mi/~195KM Marathon Level involving a timed run around the entire island of O'ahu. The amount of traffic in the said event is noticeably heavy and to make things worse, the Wanted Meter is turned on which will make you wish you won't ever touch a single traffic car with your Infinity +1 Sword like the Saleen S7 Twin Turbo during the race. Worse yet, you're under a tight time crunch; the gold-medal time is an hour, and the event's started with a fifteen-minute timer which is only extended by 1:45 at every checkpoint, and will result in failure should it run dry. Meanwhile, in TDU2 (as "Oahu tour"), it becomes more of a Breather Level as the traffic is completely disabled and you'll only have to worry about crashing your car if you're about to reach a tight corner at 250 MPH instead. Once you finally beat the event, you'll finally earn one million dollars (five million aside from the Ariel Atom 500 V8 as a reward in TDU2) for your trouble.
- TDU1 also has at least three other absolute nightmare challenges: "The Mighty Kingpin", a very twisty time-trial winding through the Pearl Harbor shipyards that's locked to Group C (usually grand-tourer and modern muscle) cars, packing heavy traffic, cops and a tight time limit; "Tour of the Island", an "anything-goes" counter-clockwise one-lap race of the the entire island against very fast cars, albeit completely without traffic, cops or penalties (and netting a significant $800K payout, achievement and game progression bonus for a win); and lastly, the diabolical "Tantalus": a hellish timed sprint down a tight, snaking mountain pass in traffic, locked to Group A (supercars, hypercars) or Group B (older supercars), the two fastest categories of the game. To rub more salt to the wound: there's a penalty meter, meaning that even running one tire off the road or scraping against traffic cars will result in time penalties getting tacked on should you manage to finish.
- The asphalt driving schools in TDU2 are far more harder than the Classic and Off-Road driving schools. You're required to drive cars that are unbearably unstable with Sport driving assists such as the Mercedes-Benz CLK 63 AMG Black Series (C209), the Dodge Viper SRT-10 (ZB II) and the 2011 Aston Martin V8 Vantage due to being rear-wheel drivetrain. The worst offenders are "Preparing for the real thing" from A5-A4 license, "Down the mountain", "Pass them all!" and "Circuit" from the A3-A2 license and "Advance slalom" from the A1 license test as it heavily relies with trial-of-error so one mistake and you fail.
- Values Dissonance:
- Tail missions, where your objective is to keep your car within range of another car that belongs to your passenger's girlfriend until she reaches her destination. Not exactly the worst thing you could do but something just feels wrong about doing it. Somewhat justified, as the reason you're following them is to see whether or not their partner is cheating on them. Still weird that they'd rely on someone in an insanely expensive and loud supercar to be discreet when in reality it would just draw more attention than it's worth.
- TDU1's courier missions can feel rather uncomfortable to play thanks to the mission-givers tending to act very shifty and suspicious, leading to the player's likely conclusion that the valuable package they're transporting contains some manner of contraband or stolen property.
