Currently Playing: Sega Rally

Another game where I enjoyed the demo but not enough to warrant an immedeate full price purchase. Another new year bargain.

In most driving/racing games the cars are very much the stars. In Sega Rally it's very much the tracks that are the stars. There's a reasonable selection of Rally cars to choose from based in 3 catergories from current rally cars to the outlawed rally beasts of the early 80s (also includes the Celica and Intergrale from the original Arcade Classic) and though there's no damage they do get nice and dirty as a race progresses.

But it's the tracks that really shine. Groups of three tracks are themed in certain areas such as tropical, arctic and desert and each looks very distinctive as well as being very Sega. Not only have the tracks been designed to be deceptively simple there's a lot of depth when you've learnt them. More importantly there's a great track deformation system. Each vehicles tyres cut grooves into the snow and mud and this causes the track to deform as they react together and make each lap a slightly different experience. It looks much better than a similar system in Motorstorm and actually seems to effect the racing more too.

It is quite an arcadey experience. Theres a career campaign where enought points must be won through racing to unlock more events, single races, time trials and multiplayer (both split screen and Live) and that's basically your lot.

At first it's frustrating as the competition starts tough and just gets tougher. However after a bit of practice you start to get in the grove. Basically trying to react to a corner as you approach it in the normal manner (brake, steer, accelerate) isn't going to work. You need to have the car positioned and drifting correctly before the bend. Importantly you have to link the bends together too so as you exit the first bend in the right place to take the next one. When it clicks it's a lot of fun. The game runs at a great speed and there's plenty going on with cars and mud/gravel or snow flying everywhere.

On the downsides the AI cars are perhaps a little aggressive. Also in the campaign mode there's no way of restarting a race without quitting out and attempting all three races again. As you need to win all three events to get maximum points this can be annoying.

It works well on Live too. I tried hosting and joining ranked games and found a reasonable selection of levels and experience on offer. From hardcore players to people like me who'd picked it up in the sales. I won 5 out of 10 races which I felt wasn't a bad ratio. Especially compared to say RR6 where all I got where cans of whupass.