It’s disappointing to me I’m afraid. I regret the purchase.
First up I will say the graphics aren’t bad at all. It’s pretty much on a par with PCars 2 and actually reminds me a lot of how Forza 7 looks and feels. Very smooth even with lots going on and it’s definitely sharper and cleaner than PC2. I can’t find anywhere to turn off motion blur which is bad to the point of distraction for me. I turn it off in any game that lets me, plays havoc with my eyes. (Xbox One X, prioritise resolution)
I find the sounds worse, the balance is wrong and it doesn’t have the rawness of some racing games, inc PC2. But I thunk it’s an audio balancing issue more than dumbed down sounds.
It is definitely pad first, wheel second. It does feel fun on a pad, however there are some huge caveats. The game is heavy handed to the extreme. All assists off in the Formula B in Catalunya and its like a pro drift setup. That’s not to say it just slides all the time, the car has plenty of grip, but when it does break loose you don’t really need to do much as there is an assist working in the background to counter steer for you, which means you can hold crazy drifts for this type of car. And it can’t be turned off. There’s too much damping on the controller for me, loses a lot of the feel and with the counter steer assist it’s just lacking that connection that Forza and Gran Turismo give you. It doesn’t take much skill to play.
This plays into the physics feeling dumbed down for sure. With heavy handed assists, no damage, it becomes a bit of a bashing fest with bigger fields of cars. So any jam e to the driving physics is lost in the sense that it doesn’t really matter. It doesn’t feel like Grid, but you can play it like Grid. Just bash around. I think the underlying physics are there but they do take a backseat and don’t really matter. All the talk of dynamic driveline modelling, completely irrelevant.
Corner cutting penalties are absolutely crazy harsh. Running 11th out of 31, went wide on a turn, deemed to be a cut despite losing time and it slowed me down so much for so long I went to 31st, 3 seconds off the next car. Crazy.
Career mode will be a grind, you don’t get credits for races just for levelling up at certain points in the XP bar. So cash can be hard to come by. This wouldn’t be so bad if custom race had more options to have some fun races but it doesn’t and in the races I did I had some absolutely ludicrous fields of cars that, for me personally, ruin the enjoyment. 90% of my time would be spent in custom races to grind credits and have fun and it just isn’t there for me unfortunately.
Livery editor is solid, plenty of options, loads of real world decals and some nice looking fictional ones, lots of options with race numbers plates and license plates. Don’t have to buy wheels they are just all available in customisation.
There is tuning and car setups, but there’s 3 default setups and a 4th slot you have to buy with credits to effectively unlock the tuning. And it seems to be the same set of parameters regardless of car so there’s no ability to adjust turbo pressure in the Lotus 98t for example.
On the plus side, along with the graphics. There’s lots in career mode and the car and track list are excellent.
I will however be seeking a refund as it is just not worth the asking price for me. I’ll get some flack I’m sure but the heavy handed assists you can’t turn off, the atrocious grids you get in custom race which you’ll be doing a lot to try and grind XP and credits, the distractingly painful motion blur and the lack of fun I’ve had in custom racing, just simply don’t make it worth my hard earned cash. It’ll be fun at £25-£30.
at this stage.
