Project Gotham Racing 2

[dc-arena]

I'll have a look out for 'em. Cheers.

[stroppa]

my rapidly declining eye-sight makes it difficult to see where I'm going in the night races, especially in the wide-open tracks, like the moscow tracks for example.

Anyway, I'm currently resisting the game because it's been depriving me of sleep.

[Concept]

Yes it does seem to suffer from that old MSR/PGR can't-quite-make-out-some-of-the track-ahead problem. However, it's usually not much trouble because it's only in the far off distance when apparent.

I've put roughly 20 hours in offline so far, and despite the added Live component being said to arguably transform the experience, I'm still enjoying playing this. Yes the AI for the most part is awful, but it's the sheer variety, polish and design thought evident in PGR2 which makes it fun. And for some reason, it reminds me of Shenmue. There's a certain 'tourist' aspect to the experience of visiting all these real-life places that adds to my compulsion of play. Visually, it's one of the most impressive titles I've seen in a long, long while. At first I wasn't sure if Bizarre were taking the right idea on by cramming so many cities in, and consequently diluting the number of tracks each one had compared to MSR/PGR. But in hindsight, the mixture of different flavours work really well together.

The Good:

I like the showroom/garage aspects, the way you can walk around in first-person and take any car out for a spin. I like the fact there's at least three varied radio stations to choose from in each of the ten cities. I like the improved sense of car handling, and the more forgiving additions to the kudos system. I like the fact the game will let you choose from any difficulty level when and as you go, meaning there is a frustration-less freeform aspect to the proceedings, helping things flow. I like the fact the game 'remembers' which radio station you last chose for each city. I like the varying differences between the classes of the world kudos series. I like the aesthetic appeal of the damage system, as although it doesn't actually affect any handling mechanics, it adds to the illusion that your car has a physical presence in its world. I like the different styles of lighting used to reflect the different parts of the world each city takes place in.

The Bad:

Yet, although, the technical recreation of places like Sydney and Yokohama is absolutely immense for the most part, there are a few problems. For a start, if you look closely as you drive you'll notice the changes in LoD are very pronounced on some of the scenery during a variety of sections... As in buildings suddenly jump from one detail level to another right in front of you. This is evident in the replays, because you'll notice that the background always get blurred out (to an extent), and is centrally focused on your car and away from more scenic views of the cities. Indeed, I still have a problem with the replays in the PGR series as a whole. Namely, the presentation and handling of them gets blown out of the water by GT3. I don't like the fact either that when it rains in the game, car windscreen wipers don't move. In a way it takes away from the sense of realism when driving about these real life locales, and in comparison to the attention of detail elsewhere, it seems a small oversight. And neither does the rain bounce or drip off the cars at all, it's as if they are protected by an invisible halo. Also, the menu system is still a relatively convoluted affair and you'd think after having had three chances to get a streamlined version right, Bizarre would have by now. And as someone mentioned before, sometimes the cars for no apparent reason go out of control. It isn't understeer because it sometimes happens without any sliding, and it does feel as though the control is moving in the opposite direction to the one you're pressing. It doesn't happen often, but when it does, this is noticeable. Another small irritation is also the fact that when you start a course, the radio stations nearly always begin from a pre-determined marker, meaning because a race is usually only 3-4 minutes you tend to keep hearing the same tracks over and over again. What would have made more sense would have been a randomised positioning system which picks a number of different spots to start from within the radio tracklists.

Summary:

In the end, although I've listed more bad points than good, I feel the criticisms of this game are really only minor niggles and up to now I've found it to be the best racing game I've played this year. The strength of what this title does right, far outweigh the negatives. At least for me.

[g-funk]

Nice little trick to change the colour of your car to any colour within the game.

1) Go Online & join/make a room
2) Choose the car you want to change the colour of (example: Ford Focus RS)
3) Then choose the car that has the color you want (example: the Orange Vauxhall vx 220)
4) Exit to the main menu (single player, multiplayer, options, etc. screen)
5) Go to Single Player > Kudos World Series
6) Go to the class where the car you want is (example: Compact sports series for the Focus) Dont enter the class, just highlight it.
7) Exit to the main menu
8.) Re-join the online room

Your Focus (or whatever) should be a nice new orange colour (or whatever you chose).

[g-funk]

Someone seems to have hacked the viewpoint too, seems like Bizarre went to a lot of trouble with the interior models to leave this out. Maybe an unlockable?

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/burnett_mansfield/Incar_PGR2.wmv

[MonkeyWrench]

That is very cool. Here's hoping *crosses fingers*

[Commander Marklar]

That is very cool indeed - I wish there was a view like that in game! It almost looks real (well, viewing it on my PC screen at any rate).

[Brats]

Wow! How fantastic does that look? The view from just besides the drivers helmet is probably a bit impractical, but it sure looks cool.

It seems odd that they'd go to all that trouble and then leave it out . Maybe it's an unlockable, or maybe they couldn't get the interiors for all 102 cars done in time?

[Hodge]

It`s clearly not an unlockable as you can hardly see the steering wheel move. It`s just that bizarre have spent time giving us a decent character for the car like they always done and modeled the interiors for when you look at the cars in the showroom. They probably just hacked it so they can put the camera where they want but does show us another clear example the amount of detail this game posseses.

[baad bwoy]

Is there anyway to see overall score tables for this game on live, which are made up of the scores gathered from all races?not just individual races

[Baz]

Wow. This game is absolutely brilliant. Very, very enjoyable, and technically accomplished. But my finger hurts now so I've had to stop playing.

At first I tried accelerating with my middle finger but it just doesn't 'feel' right, like wanking with your wrong hand, although I fear if my fingers won't strengthen up from playing this game I'll just have get used to it. And beat people with either finger. Like Ronnie O'Sullivan.

[Chief H]

If that is a hack it's a pretty good one! I love the way the viewpoint seems to lurch forward slightly under braking and lets the car bounce on impact. Not too much, not too little. As I said, if that's a hack, I am VERY impressed!

[Inertia_]

If that is a hack it's a pretty good one! I love the way the viewpoint seems to lurch forward slightly under braking and lets the car bounce on impact. Not too much, not too little. As I said, if that's a hack, I am VERY impressed!

It is a hack. It is a pretty good one. It is, in fact, this one:

These are the settings you need to change in car dynamics/camera_settings.ini

targetHeight0 = 0.595
targetAngle0 = -0.150
rotationRate0 = 7.400
chaseDistance0 = -0.645
fov0 = 0.975
chaseVelocityLagRatio0 = 0.40
chaseDistanceSpring0 = 3.50
chaseBreakingPitch0 = 0.045

A word of warning though, the reason why they probably did not include this camera angle is because some cars cockpits are in different positions. Therefore what may look great with one car might look horrible with another (i.e. you see the bonnet only).

If I were you, though, I'd change these settings instead:

targetHeight1 = 0.595
targetAngle1 = -0.150
rotationRate1 = 7.400
chaseDistance1 = -0.645
fov1 = 0.975
chaseVelocityLagRatio1 = 0.40
chaseDistanceSpring1 = 3.50
chaseBreakingPitch1 = 0.045

...simply because you'll then be able to cycle between chase, in-car and bumper views, leaving you with a perfectly playable AND hacked copy of PGR2.

Oh, and if you thought the video looked cool, take a look behind you...

[Chief H]

'nuff respect - that is awesome!

[John Beaulieu]