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Improve your speed with these The Crew 2 tips
Don’t settle for being a passenger in The Crew 2. Dominate with our tips for cars, boats and planes.
With so much on offer in The Crew 2 it can take more than a little while to attune yourself to the finer details as you struggle to digest the bigger picture. However, your chances of winning are greatly improved if you focus on delving below the surface and understanding the nitty gritty of piloting planes, boats and cars.
Based on hours of play we’ve come up with a selection of essential tips to help you take control of some of The Crew 2’s hidden details and start improving your speed immediately.
Master these and you’ll find yourself moving up the leaderboards in no time.
Avoid the handbrake when drifting
Proper use of brakes and steering is enough to drift
© Ubisoft
Based on your understanding of other racing games you might be tempted to use the handbrake during The Crew 2’s drift events. However, this is not the best way to attain the highest scores.
The handling model used for drifting is designed to make it as easy as possible to set your car on a sideways path, with the skill coming from maintaining this position for as long as each corner will allow. As such, tapping the brake and turning the wheel in unison is all that’s needed to initiate a drift.
Opting for this approach gives you far more control than relying on the handbrake. Once sideways, feather the throttle gently, as opposed to putting your foot full down, to keep the slide going.
Use extreme mode when flying
It’s not a feature that’s well publicised within the game, but there is an ‘extreme’ option available when piloting any of The Crew 2’s planes. At the press of a button (square on a PS4 pad) your plane will become much more sensitive to your analogue stick inputs, increasing your ability to pull off audacious loops, rolls and flying upside down.
This gives you more breathing space to complete the aerial stunt missions, especially when they become more challenging later in the game. However, the extreme movement does make the plane more twitchy and difficult to control.
As such, we recommend that you start using the option immediately upon starting to play so that you’re well versed in how to control the plane in this way before things get more taxing later on.
Pull back on the left stick when in a boat
Reducing drag increases your speed over the water
© Ubisoft
Another trick that isn’t fully explained within the game itself is the ability to use the left stick as a means of gaining speed in boats. Pulling back on the stick will raise the front of the boat a little, reducing drag and increasing your top speed.
The catch is that the boat becomes a little less responsive through corners and, as such, accurately positioning it to achieve the perfect racing line can be difficult.
Our advice is to use the trick whenever you’re racing through stretches of water that, roughly, follow a straight line. As soon as you’re face with sharp corners, revert to using the left stick in a ‘normal’ fashion.
Resist the urge to go flat out offroad
When racing offroad, across country that is without predefined routes between checkpoints, it pays to give yourself a little bit of thinking time before charging through the trees, hills or marshes.
Clearly, you don’t want to slow down too much when plotting the best path to the next checkpoint – but having a clear idea can save you an enormous amount of time down the line.
The last thing you want is to find yourself having to pick through thick forest or get bogged down in a shallow river or lake. Once you have memorised the geography you can, of course, speed up and use your knowledge to your advantage.
Focus on long bouts of nitro, not small bursts
Patience pays off when it comes to nitro
© Ubisoft
Every vehicle in The Crew 2 comes with nitrous by default. As tempting as it might be to use it whenever possible, it’s best to let the associated meter fill up as much as possible before you initiate the speed boost it offers. In almost all cases, firing your nitro for long periods is preferable to using it in small, stunted chunks.
It takes a short while for your vehicle to hit maximum speed after you press the nitro button, so if your meter is only partially loaded you might not even hit your potential maximum pace. This is a great way to frustrate yourself in that you’ll find yourself catching up to the leaders only to fall back as your nitro dies out.
Waiting for your nitro allowance to hit maximum and spending it all in one go on a long, safe straight is the way to achieve the biggest gains. Be patient and the speed will come.
Watch the waves
Carving out a smooth line with as little disruption as possible is key to setting the quickest time in a boat, and one of the best ways of doing exactly that is to keep a constant eye on what the waves are doing.
As a rule, you want to avoid moving into waves as much as possible as speeding through them increases the height of the water that your boat needs to displace and can cause you bump along the surface rather than glide over it.
Along with the natural rhythm of the waves, you need to avoid the wake created by other boats. Therefore, do not follow directly behind your opponents as this will slow you down significantly. On the flip side, cutting in front of anyone trying to overtake you is a great way to reduce their speed and limit any threat they pose.
