Right a bit, left a bit, Drive (Colin McRae Rally 2 (PC))

Member Name: callancool

Product:	Colin McRae Rally 2 (PC)
Date:	28/08/03 (391 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great graphics, diverse environments

Disadvantages: hard to handle, jerky videos on low speed c rom drives

OVERVIEW.
Ah, the P.C. Racing game is a genre that's overflowing with many mediocre titles, always has and always will be, especially for those who don't like the sight of blood in their games. Codemasters speciality is sports simulations, and whenever they release a new one they seem to gain critical acclaim from all quarters. From Jonah Lomu Rugby, through to World Championship snooker, to Colin Mc. Rae 3 and Toca Rae driver. Their racing sims are no exception. So it seems. But are they deserving of the acclaim they receive? Jonah Lomu Rugby is difficult to play on the P.C. (It's a playstation conversion), Toca Touring cars was graphically poor in my opinion and difficult to drive. Its follow-up Toca 2 was graphically excellent with only a single processor speed difference between then but still hard to control, whilst World Championship snooker was spot on.

In the main, P.C. Racing games are more difficult to drive on the P.C. (probably because PC's are seen as adult and consoles for the kids), and in my opinion a good Racer should be easy to drive but not too easy, which is a point on which most actually fall down because even on easy levels you end up driving into walls all the time, or coming off the track whilst cornering. The original Screamer was a classic racing game because it handled superb, but its follow p screamer two was a let down because of bad controlling of the cars.

THE GAME

So how does Colin Mc. Rae 2 rate as a driving game? Does it make the grade or not? And was it any better than its predecessor, the similarly titled Colin Mc. Rae rally? Well on both points the answer has to be Yes. However it does suffer from a number of glitches that can spoil your enjoyment of the game. The main gripe is with joystick selection. Unusually Codemasters racing titles require that you select between analogue and digital control methods whilst setting the game up. If like me you don't know whether you have
an analogue or digital device then you'll find that the menu's seem to jump about of their own free will rather like the gearbox on the 1968 Vauxhall Victor my father used to own in the 70's. He never did own a brand new motor ,and in a way I'm like him with my P.C. Games as I never buy them when they first come out, I always wait until they're on budget (£5 Sold Out or similar) labels. Actually getting the menu's to stay still long enough seems to be a big problem. And it seems to be only Codemasters games in the main that have this Analogue/Digital selection, as opposed to a simple keyboard/joystick selection that most racers have.

SETUP.

As I just mentioned if you don't know whether your input device is analogue or digital can cause a headache, but if you can live with jumpy menus then setup isn't a big problem. If you're running on or over recommended specs then in theory you can run with all the detail on, but its not the case. The box states that an 8 meg graphics card is required, but I was running the demo version of the game for ages on a 4 meg card whilst the original CMR game which was supposed to work on any D3D card refused to run the game. Admittedly my PC was a 333 with 224 megs of memory, but the graphics card was poor yet CMR2 ran. Admittedly there was graphical corruption but not enough to spoil the demo. Not long after buying a 32 meg TNT2 card sold out released the full game for a fiver so I bought it. Performance wise it ran fast-ish, but considering minimum specs were a 233 and an 8 meg card it should have run like lightning, but it didn't. Maybe it was down to the great graphics, or the 1024 x 768 resolution I was running it on, but it should have run faster. Users have complete graphical setup, and whilst you can turn all the enhancements off, the cars loose a lot of detail in low detail mode, whereas the scenery didn't. Maybe those on min specs will have to turn all detail to l
ow to get it to run fast, but I can see it crawling on bottom spec.

You also have to setup a Driver profile which is easy enough, and then the car. Setting up the car is a matter of personal choice, but for me stiff suspension and a low car with a slightly less than half way steering sensitivity helps.

THE TRACKS.

Well they reckon there's about 90 tracks to play. I only found 83, which is impressive nonetheless. They're twisty and require expert driving at all times. I'm forever coming off, smashing up the car to bits and limping in last all the time. Taking things a little slower helped a lot, and I even managed to WIN (shock horror, or should that be schlock?) The first Swedish stage, but on the whole even on easy mode it' difficult to drive, however I set the car up. The tracks range from the muddy English countryside and stately homes, through the dusty African dirt tracks and Aussie outback, to the frozen wastelands of northern Europe. Its a good variety, and the last stage of each rally is a two lane head to head.

THE CARS.
There's a variety of modern rally cars to choose from, including Mc. Rae's Focus, and his old Imprezza, as well as the smaller cars such as Skodas and Lancias. For classic Racing there's a Mini Cooper and an Ezzie Mexico (Ford Escort Mk 1 Mexico) though a mark 1 'Locort' (Lotus Cortina) would have been welcome too. Handling between all the cars doesn't differ a great deal, and in high detail mode they look stunning, even by today's standards. The Ford Puma for example has lovely shiny paint work, so obviously someone in the Codemasters graphics department has been busy with the T-cut. As for the damage you infict upon your poor vehicle, then it's flawlessly reproduced. bumpers hang of, showering the road with sparks, bonnets fly open and flap up and down as you hurtle along, and if you smash all the windows (all too easy to do), then you can see right
through the holes on both sides to the other side. But don't worry, it's all repairable at the next stop (which is after every two stages) so you'll be looking first rate again in no time.

GRAPHICS.

As I stated in the last paragraph the graphics on the cars are superb, and the detail in the rest of the game is just as impressive. Kenya for example stands out for its magnificent 'Flame trees of Thikka' (now who remembers that on the telly?) Trees (what else would it be for?), though I was surprised that some stationary objects like parked cars and trucks did not stand out as 3d as they did on the original game, though being much more detailed. Couldn't Codemasters make them stand out in 3d more?

HANDLING.

Well for me it handled disappointingly. Maybe it's because I prefer cheap joypads (right scrooge aren't I?), or it's because of my P.C. not being able to recognise whether or not they're analogue or digital, or simply that you need a really expensive controller (shame on Codemasters - for making it so it needs top notch hardware so those with big wallets and bigger computers than brains bought it first time out - if they did make it that way ) to run it properly. But this doesn't spoil the enjoyment as its actually quite fun smashing the car up.

VERDICT.

Well, whichever way you look at it its a top notch classy game with outstanding graphics, and even though its over 2 years old now, it looks as good as many new games on the market. The main issue with the game I have is the controller issue, for if Codemasters could have sorted this out and made the cars handle as good as the original screamer did then in my book it would be an unbeatable classic. But because of the control problems I have to rate it as a 4 star not a 5. But at only a fiver if you're a fan of racing games then this is a must for your collection.

SPECS.

Processor, 233 MHz, <
br>Graphics, 8 meg 3d card (demo runs on a 4 meg)
5 meg hard drive
8x CD (runs OK on a 4x drive, though the intro videos are choppy and jerky).
DX 7 or better.

Summary: