Think sexy. Cranked all the way up, this game so gorgeous that I'd be making advances on it if it were a girl-even if she were my best friend's notoriously easy, disease-ridden sister. At lower settings, the shape detail and the brilliant lighting will still wow you, but if you have a GeForce 4Ti or a Radeon 9700, this game was made for you. No joke, UT 2k3 is the first game out designed make use of the current top end video cards. If you're big on pretty, it's worth getting the game just to go gaga over.

Words can't say what you wouldn't be better off seeing. Go view some screen shots if you need more convincing.

Sound Off:
It's not horrible, but the sound is far from matching the graphics in quality. You'll notice that the music is new. An epic, gladiatorial fanfare-similar to what you might hear on Monday night football shows-plays during all the pre-game menus (that, if anything, should get you thinking UT is on its way to becoming a sports game franchise). Unfortunately, that's as good as it gets, as the designers seem to have traded in all the odd and dark space-future mood for some brooding, wannabe-goth soft metal.

Ambient sounds are hardly noticeable until you're close to the source, and while some weapon effects are decent, if lacking a real bass punch, others are surprisingly weak. Case in point: the lightning gun sounds like a static electricity shock. You'd expect limb-shredding electricity to sound like thunder, but no.

Likewise, the voicing could use some work. For better or worse the same immature adult taunts are there-with some new jabs. Gone, however, is the light and sexy sci-fi-friendly tutorial voice, replaced with an average, bored sounding female. Worse is the new announcer's voice, a Madden 2003 reject that's a poor match for the death-sport attitude. They thankfully kept the old, deeper, echo-ridden announcer for such encouraging messages as "hat trick," "unstoppable," and "rampage"