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 - Absolutely best racing game to buy.This is a great buy. A fan of both arcade (Need for Speed series) and sim (Formula 1 2002) racing, this game has been and still is very fun for me. I'm not sure I would call it a simulation - even with all of the assists off - but it's realistic enough to make it challenging. Yet it's fairly forgiving in terms of racing a damaged car, going off the pavement for a second, coming back in a race after spinning out, etc. The combination of these two properties goes a long way in keeping the game very fun. The flashback feature is a novel idea, one that should've been introduced to racing games a long time ago, and although it feels a little bit like cheating, it saves you the frustration of restarting races over and over. One great thing about this game is the variety of racing - classic muscle, tuner cars, drifting, Le Mans, Formula 3 and more, there's something for whatever flavor of fast you want. Formula 3 is very fun, and though it's a far cry from the realism of EA's F1 2002, it's pretty nice not spinning out every time you don't take a corner _just_ right. This is the first game that I've played with drifting, but I think it's excellent. It's more challenging and the learning curve is a bit steeper, but this helps keep the game fun after completing 100% single player. There's something really satisfying about completing a perfect 3-lap run with a single 46X combo. And the pro muscle, pro tuned, touring and Le Mans races are just excellent good 'ol racing. The difficulty levels range from walk in the park to REALLY difficult. The AI is quite good, there's only 1 track configuration out of the many where they don't seem to be able to get around in a timely manner. The only thing that they can't really compete in is drifting. Even in the special unlock-when-you-beat-the-game 'ninja' difficulty setting, I can beat them in points in drift GP in last place taking my time. Once you get the hang of drifting (which is very fun), you can exponentially increase your score by never losing your combo. They make mistakes - this was done on purpose - and it leads to a more realistic experience. There are memorable moments watching AI drivers slam into each other and/or go flying, zooming past as parts fly everywhere, or sometimes getting caught in a pile-up. But there are always the AI who drive well and give you a challenge. Online racing is quite fun too. It doesn't seem to matter as much how sharp you can take the corners, but how consistently you race, which makes it more interesting because anything can happen most of the time. There's always annoying things that crop up when playing with other people, and in this game it takes the form of people running into each other in the first two seconds of the race, and people driving backwards (measures have been taken to prevent collisions this way). What could be improved is the online game menus - when first setting up the game, it's difficult to determine what kind of race you're choosing because you only get the name of the race, like "Jun Super Street". After a race series is completed, everyone votes for the next race, no way to prevent the game you hosted from changing. The way the voting works is pretty nice though - when voting, it shows you the track layout and vehicle type of the race. Why you don't get this when setting up the game is a mystery. All in all, it's a great game that more than makes up for its few flaws, and certainly worth the money for any kind of fan of racing games. Rating: - Love It!I love this game, Im into Shooter Games, like Crysis, CoD4: MW, etc.. But I try to change a lil'bit and bought this game, I like the gameplay, the desings, everything. If you're looking for a racing cars game, don't look forward, buy this! Recomendado 100% :) Rating: - Semi-realistic action racing gameIf you don't like action racing games because they are so un-realistic, and get frustrated with simulation racing games because of the tuning and practice needed to compete; GRID is the perfect game for you. Likes: - All cars handle differently - The graphics are amazing (the replay looks like real TV) - You can see damage to your car - You don't have to be a car expert to tune your car to get the best time for each track. (no tuning) Could improve: - The other cars will quickly catch up to you or wait for you if you get ahead of the pack or fall behind it (so un-realistic). - It takes major crashing to affect the performance of the car. You can go from last place into the inside of a curve and brake late, then crash your way into at least mid pack. - You can easily go from 1st to last place by spinning out in a curve on the last lap. All cars like to stay grouped together and run 2 wide. - Force feedback could be better in the turns If the other cars were spread out more (first 3 issues), it would be the perfect racing game for me. Rating: - GRID is great fun!After playing the free GRID Dmmo (v1.0 released in April/May 2008), I bought GRID the first day it hit local retail store on 6/4/08 (I didn't want to wait for shippimg delay, sorry Amazon), and have been playing it non-stop ever since. I've completed the offline GridWorld career against the excellent in-game AI drivers, and now mostly play online multiplayer. I occasionally re-run some career events and frequently practice in RaceDay against AI because they are so fun. On & offline, GRID runs great (typ 80-100 fps) on my above-spec desktop PC (Core2Duo 3Ghz, 8800GT/512MB video card, G25 wheel+pedals), check your system against the specs to be sure it'll run well on your PC. As others recommended if you're unsure if your PC can handle it (or you want to check out the game's look & feel), download and play the FREE v1.1 Demo. If you do buy GRID PC DVD, be sure to download and install the v1.2 patch - it has some fixes and adds some nifty options (including optional Assists Disabled and optional Collisions On/ Forward Only/ Off settings for hosting online racing). I've read in CodeMasters' Grid forum that Console (XBox, PS3) patch to date lacks some of the v1.2 PC patch features. Handling with wheel is exceptional, but undriveable (at least for me & most other players) with keyboard. Handling varies for various gamepads (probably related to whether pad has analog or digital outputs), I suggest you read the forums if you're a gamepadder (I'm not). CodeMasters recently announced they will release a download content (DLC) package this Fall - no details currently on full content (additional tracks,if any, unknown; at least 2 additional cars ahve been announced, the McLaren F1 sports GT and the Nardo VW W12 GT), and currently unknown if this forthcoming DLC will be free or not (I'll pay whateber they charge!). GRID is more toward arcade behaviour than their earlier ToCA Race Driver 2 (get it!), and much more arcade style than simulation race games including SimBin's GTR2 and Race07 WTCC. Hence GRID is easier for the non-hardcore gamer than the steep learning curve fullon cutomizable simulation games. If you're hardcore sim, you probably won't like GRID's lack of car tuning (personally I enjoy GRID's level playing field, and it's awesome + easy paint jobs). If you're not hardcore simmer, I think you'll find HRID is really fun, Terrific graphics (btw there are some config tweaks posted in forums to reduce blur & HDR and to improve color saturation much to my liking); very good audio, great AI, 3 Assist parameters each optionally On/Off, smooth netplay, etc., etc. Get GRID! Rating:  - Great Racing Game!This game was really frustrating with a keyboard but once I got a PS2 style controller I couldn't stop playing. It's a great game and the drift gp matches never get old!!!
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