Burnout: Revenge is a single-player and multiplayer arcade-style racing game focused on high-speed competition and vehicular destruction. Players race through dense traffic and urban environments where victory depends not only on finishing first but also on aggressively eliminating rivals through spectacular crashes known as takedowns.

The game expands the series’ signature formula with new mechanics that emphasize aggression and momentum. Impact Time returns, slowing down the action during collisions to highlight the crash and allowing players to steer their wrecked car using Aftertouch to cause secondary accidents. Crashbreakers, explosive detonations of wrecked vehicles, now appear in both crash events and some standard races. A key new feature is traffic checking, which lets players slam same-direction civilian vehicles into opponents, turning regular cars into offensive tools. Successfully chaining reckless driving maneuvers such as drifts, near-misses, and takedowns builds boost, while wins and signature takedowns increase the player’s Revenge Rank, unlocking new cars and events.

Game modes include traditional races, grand prix circuits, and time-based Burning Laps, alongside modes that reward destruction. Road Rage challenges players to take down as many rivals as possible before time or car health runs out. Traffic Attack, introduced in this installment, tasks players with wrecking civilian traffic for points against the clock. Eliminator races remove the last-place driver each lap until one remains. Crash Mode returns in a revised form: instead of free acceleration into intersections, players must time their boost at the start, then rely on steering, Aftertouch, and Crashbreakers to maximize chaos.

The single-player World Tour mode spans multiple tiers across real-world-inspired tracks set in the United States, Europe, and Asia, offering a wide variety of vehicles from compact cars to supercars and heavy muscle machines. Performance medals in events contribute to unlocking new rides and additional challenges.

Multiplayer options are available both offline and online. Offline play includes two-player split-screen races, Traffic Attack competitions, and party-style Crash events supporting up to six players in hot-seat mode. Online play supports up to six players in competitive races and crash-based events, with features that allow players to upload and share replays of record-breaking performances.