DoWN 'N' DiRT(y) (Colin McRae: DIRT (Xbox 360))

Member Name: Stunt 101

Product:	Colin McRae: DIRT (Xbox 360)
Date:	10/06/08 (232 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Amazing visuals, excellent racing, great presentation, fantastic car effects.

Disadvantages: Not exactly deep, slowdown hurts visuals, awful online multiplayer (if you can call it that!).

The first thought that came to my mind when I brought this was 'it's a shame he died'. Last year in September, Rally Driver Collin McRae died with his 6-year old son in a Helicopter crash. It's a shame he died, not only because he is a talented driver, but he was a great man overall. He also has worked with Codemasters for 10 years to create fantastic rally games. DiRT is the first game to debut on Microsoft's next-generation console, after making an impact on older consoles like the Playstation and the Playstation 2. The series has always been about hardcore rally racing, all about time trials and getting to the end of the course quickest. But with DiRT, it has off-road racing as well as timed racing. If you have seen the screenshots, you'll know that this game looks incredible, but is it enough?

-(The Controls)-
DiRT controls like your standard racing game, where you hold down the right trigger to accelerate and the other trigger is used for braking. The face buttons are used to look back, gear down, gear up and handbrake. You can change the camera view with the left bumper, look around with the right analog stick and steer with either the D-Pad or the left analog stick. There are also three other control schemes if this doesn't appeal to you, and you can also use the Force Feedback wheel to play if you want to be immersed. The cars handle fantastically. It all depends on what car you're driving, as a fast car is going to have slightly loose handling, yet a big rig is going to struggle to turn. They also vary depending on how the performance is, as a car could be nimble but be loose at the end of the car. The handling is fantastic, and you can change the control scheme if you don't like it. Cars can feel a bit floaty at times, but this does lead to some spectacular crashes.

-(The Gameplay)-
DiRT is a Rally racing game taking place in a variety of locations including the UK, USA and Japan. There are six racing disciplines. They include Rally, the standard time trial, Rally Cross, the European racing events and Rally Raid where you race against other people in the USA. There is also Hillclimb, CORR, and Crossover, which are well explained by Travis Pastrana with a touch of the Y button at the menus. Each event is different, forcing you to use a type of car on a different track, though most of the time you're in Rally races, which means that people who hate Time Trials should avoid DiRT. The type of events seems limited, but there are lots of events to go around. It's just a shame the events aren't balanced well enough as it's mostly Time Trials.

The main mode of play is the Career, where you are introduced to a huge Pyramid full of events and races. The pyramid is split up into sections with one event, which you can earn a maximum of ten career points in the event by coming first. As you earn points, you can go up to the next Tier, and keg going up the pyramid until you reach the top which is Tier 11. That's the career in a nutshell really, it's all about moving up the pyramid until the top. That said, you can decide on some things. If you do well at races, you can actually skip some of the boxes and just go onto the next Tier though you'll miss out on money needed to buy cars for special events. At first, there is usually just one race in each box, but as you go up the Pyramid, you'll find that the number of events in each box increases.

The career mode is addictive as ranking up and earning lots of money is rewarding, but the career mode isn't exactly hard. No matter what difficulty you are on, you can still earn 10 points from each event for coming first. This means you could blow through the career quickly. But really, you'll want to go on higher difficulties as the easier difficulties are simply boring. On the easiest difficulty, the enemy A.I. is a cakewalk and you don't really get penalized for crashing and damaging your vehicle. But if you're on the difficulty after the easiest, cars can be damaged to the point of where you can't finish the race. For example, I nearly finished a Rally race when I crashed into a pole so hard my wheels fell off. I was a bit frustrated, but had no problem retrying the race because it was so enjoyable.

Your car can be damaged in up to nine areas from Wheels to Engine to Bodywork to Suspension. Most of them can cost you a race win if you damage them enough, and as you ramp up the difficulty you must be more careful otherwise you'll fail immediately. You can also adjust settings to change the parts of the cars. You can change the stiffness of your suspension springs, change the transmission and make it so that your car has less chance of rolling. You can also apply default decals to your cars to change their look, but the customization ends there. The game can feel a bit shallow as it doesn't have the depth of something like PGR4 in races or modes.

The car list is also on the low side, but this is made up for by two things-variety and fun. There are 46 licensed vehicles in DiRT, and the variety of cars here is astonishing. From Rally cars to big rigs to Buggies to even Vans-you're sure to find something to like here. Sadly, you can't use every car on every event-specific cars are used for specific events. It's a shame too, as having a big rig going up against a buggy and a rally car would have been a treat. That said, making you use specific cars for each event means you can adjust to the different style of each car, and the game never gets repetitive as one minute you're in a rally car and the next you're smashing into a wall with a Big Rig. It would have been nice to have more cars, but it's a minor issue.

When you compete in the career mode you can replay the races from the career mode to beat the times set on each race. You can also compete in tournaments where you race a series of events with multiple races in an attempt to get the best time on each rally. There are three tourneys, and sadly the last of the three is a mix of the first two tournaments. That said playing through these tournaments can be fun. Yet, you play through these events during the career mode meaning you'll feel a sense of Déjà vu as you slog your way through the multiple races. At least you can select between long and short, meaning that you can have more or less events.

The only mode of play left is the online component. At first I was ecstatic, as on the back of the box it stated that this game supported a 100 player online mode. I thought 'how the heck can you fit 100 cars onto one track?' Then disappointment rushed through me as the two modes of play came up onto the screen-Rally and Hillclimb event. These are both time trial events, where you go through a deserted track by yourself as you try to beat other people's time as you race simultaneous, though by yourself on the track. It's a cruel joke of a multiplayer, bragging about 100 player multiplayer when really this feels like leader boards, which the game also supports. You can't choose the track or car either as you vote on it in the lobby. Plus, I struggled to find a game as other people obviously twigged how much this component sucks. Plus, there isn't any split-screen multiplayer too, which is lame.

Don't let this mode put you off DiRT though, as the game is just plain fun in its single player modes. Events like when you go behind the wheel of a big rig to get the fastest time you can as you drive up a hill are great moments, as are when you overturn your car for the first time, win your first event and crash your buggy for the first time. It's fun all the way, and it never sacrifices fun to add depth or anything like that.

DiRT is rated 12+ for language, if the back of the box is to be believed. That said I never heard any swear words throughout the whole game. There were plenty of car smashes though. But really, there is little to offend here and anyone can get into DiRT.

-(The Graphics)-
The most noticeably excellent area of DiRT is its graphics. Without question, DiRT is one of the best looking racing games on the market. The car models look identical to their real-life counterparts, with lots of detail seen in the actual cars. What's more impressive is how these cars break apart. As you smash into walls and other objects, the parts of the car will fall off like bumpers, doors, hoods, windows and more. It looks incredibly realistic and seeing your car in a complete mess has never looked so good. But the cars aren't the only things that break apart beautifully. As you travel through stunning locations in the dirty of the UK, the sunshine of Italy and the rainy tracks of Japan you'll notice there is lots to destroy in the tracks. Signs, bushes, poles, fences and other objects break apart and are left on the track as you continue your trek through the race. Other detail like going through mud leaves dirt on your car and the beautiful lighting which not only makes your car shine, but also leaves a haze in daylight, really make DiRT stand out visually. Sadly, it's clear this is too much for the system to handle, as the frame rate can chop up, especially during races with other cars. It's minor though, and DiRT is an overall beautiful game.

-(The Sound)-
The sound in DiRT is great, though not quite up to the quality of the graphics. There is never any music during gameplay, only during the menus and at the end of races. It's decent, but there is so little of it it's not very noteworthy. There are also some helpful voiceovers in menus and during gameplay, where Travis Pastrana will guide you through the races, cars and menus. During rally races you'll hear a co-pilot guiding you through the track and his words are helpful so you should listen. The only real sore spot in terms of voiceovers are at the end of races where your co-pilot or Pastrana will spurt out a nasty one-liner that grates after hearing the same few repeated. Really, the sound effects take centre stage here. Cars roar as they cross the roads, with fantastic engine sounds. The sounds change as you drive on different surfaces, and the crunch of when you crash into a corner is oddly satisfying.

-(The Replay Value)-
DiRT falters here a bit. The main career mode feels like it takes forever to complete, but in actual fact, it may take you less than 10 hours to complete with all the points. You'll have to replay it once to earn all the cars, unless you are on the hardest difficulty already. Whether you want to do that will be up to preference. If you are an achievement whore, you probably will. Speaking of which, the achievements are a decent selection. There are 49 in total, and thankfully only three of them come from the online multiplayer. This means that you can try an attempt to get the 46 of them left, which will give you about 940 gamer points. You can earn achievements from winning a number of races in a row, buying a number of cars and earning all the points in the career mode. Sadly, you could earn most of them on your first go if you're good. The multiplayer may keep you busy for a few matches, but it isn't exactly enticing.

-(The Score)-
Controls=10
Gameplay=9
Graphics=9
Sound=8
Replay Value=7
Overall Score=8.6

-(The Ending Comments)-
DiRT is a fantastic racing game as a whole. The thing that will immediately strike you is the graphics. They are absolutely stunning from the incredible car models, to the fantastic environments and lighting, to the excellent destruction of cars and environments. It can chug at times, but you can't deny that it is a beautiful game. Once you get past the graphics you find that DiRT also plays excellently too. From the fast paced rally races, to the bashful truck events-everything about DiRT is fun. It's not particularly deep, with a limited selection of cars and tracks, but its damn fun. The online play is a bit of a joke, stating 100 players online except you don't actually race against anyone. It's a slight blemish on an otherwise excellent game-if you love Rally games, or racing games in general then DiRT is a must own.

-(The Extra Info)-
This was published and developed by Codemasters.
This was released on June 15th, 2007 and is also on PC and PS3.
This is available from Amazon from £13 in the used and new section.

Summary: Rest in peace Collin.