I don't want to make it a habit to explain where I'm coming from at the start of all of my reviews, but in the case of DiRT you'll need to know my background with racing games. I confess that I've never played a Colin McRae game (if you've come here packing rotten tomatoes come out with them now!), or for that matter many driving games at all. I tried Gran Turismo 3, but, while the game was exceptionally good looking for its time, it bored me to teary death. Ridge Racer Type 4 was also one of the rare driving games I bought, and I actually got into it a fair bit. Both these games exist at opposite ends of the spectrum for racing games; you have your technical and realistic car games like Gran Turismo, and the more arcade-style types like Ridge Racer. Using that best of man's best friends, common sense, I figured that since I liked Ridge Racer more than Gran Turismo, I must like arcade racing games more than realistic ones. So with that in mind, I decided to pick up DiRT, an off-road, rally style racer, and see if it did anything for me.

   "But why not get someone who's actually good at racing games to review this?" I hear some of you whine. Firstly, Steve the Rally Guy was unavailable (and besides, if you check the Bio page on the site, you'll see that none of GameLemon's usual suspects listed "racing" among their favorite game genres). Secondly, and most importantly, a game series can always use a fresh look, and it speaks volumes of this game that it drew me, someone who can count the number of racing games he's owned using the fingers on one hand, to purchase it. All clear? Good.

A driving game, eh? Well, let's try this new-fangled thing...where's the jump button?

   As soon as you start up DiRT and get into your first race - either by going to the Career mode, or entering a single race in "Rally World" (or perhaps foolhardily jumping straight into Championship Mode) - you'll notice that DiRT has a few things going for it that other racing games don't.

   The first thing that will hit you - likely at the same moment that you make friends with your first tree - is that all the cars can be damaged, and quite impressively so. The car's body warps, dents, and even loses parts depending on where and how it crashes, and it's not just for show, as the performance of the car goes down the more busted up it becomes. It's kind of impressive, especially when you consider that some other popular car games such as Gran Turismo 4 don't include any meaningful damage indicators.

   By pressing the pause button you can view the status of every part of the car that can be damaged at any time during the race (as you know, real life rally drivers can magically monitor the damage percent of their engine in mid-race too! *cough*). Parts of the car that can be damaged include the body, the tires, the engine, the turbo, etc., and each is responsible for some aspect of driving performance. So, if the wheels become too damaged, they'll lose their grip, if the gearbox gets wrecked you won't be able to change gears as fast, and if you pinch your finger while buckling the seatbelt you'll cry like a baby. It actually is a pretty good system: when you crash in other car games you might only lose some time as you get back on the road, but in DiRT if you ever crash badly, you'll feel the impact in a very practical way as you wince at the sorry state of your now-mangled vehicle. If the crash is brutal enough your car will simply become un-drivable, and you'll be forced to restart the race.

Travel to exotic locations! Crash into all manner of wildlife and endangered species!

Where the heck did that tree jump out from?

   So you've heard about the tracks and the graphics, and now you might actually want to know what you actually do in the game (apart from drive, needless to say). Most of your time should be spent, at least initially, in Career Mode, where you race for cash through a series of races, which are divided up into different modes and tiers until you beat all the competition, and scream "I'm the king of the world!" from atop a mountain... Or something to that effect. There are a lot of races in Career Mode, all helpfully labeled and divided into modes such as "rally" races, which is just you racing alone on a track, and competing against other racers' times, "rally raid", which has you racing alongside other vehicles in smaller tracks, or "crossover", where you and another vehicle each start at different ends of a track and race to the finish. There's also "hill climb", which usually requires you to tackle them using big rig vehicles, which are trucks sporting huge power, but also the risk of tipping right off the mountain, making these races tense affairs. All up there are around 46 different cars that can be unlocked in the game, using money won from the races in Career mode, and they vary from classic cars, big rigs, buggies, uphill and so on.

Doesn't "navigator" sound more accurate than "co-driver"? The guy's giving directions; he's not exactly changing gears for you or anything.

   Before I had tried one of the rally races, where it's just you and the track, I was under the impression that they would be more boring than the races where you race against other cars, but if anything it turned out to be the exact opposite. There's something immensely satisfying in navigating a twisty course, listening and reacting to the instructions your co-driver calls out to you. And even though you're the only car on the track, in essence you're still competing against the other racers, who all tackle the course independently, and whoever gets the best time wins. There are also time points in the course and as you approach them, a timer will come up which tells you how you're faring in regards to other people's time. So, if you're in the middle of a race and see that you're 10 seconds behind the competition, you can restart the race there instead of waiting until the race is over to see your time. It's a simple, but effective system.

   But the single best thing about driving by yourself? Without doubt, it's stopping on the side of a road to take a scenic crap without being interrupted. In the world of receding natural beauty and increasing encroachments on privacy and personal space, it's the greatest of pleasures.

   On the flip side, the races which pitted me against drivers who were on the same track became almost like a chore for me to do. The courses were mostly not as fun to tackle as the rally stages, and I kept finding myself rear-ending the cars in front of me because they wouldn't get out of my way! (Violent road rage flash-backs ensue). I know this was partly because I'm not that good a driver, but the fact remains that these races (apart from those were you drive buggies) were not very enjoyable for me. It may just come down to personal preference in determining what type of races you like the most, but if you the kind of player that likes to perfect every nook and cranny of a course, solo races will be your best friend.

"Start the engine": 10 Achievement points

   For those gamerpoint addicts out there - and I count myself among you - DiRT will probably look like a free meal, for most of the achievements are simple to obtain. Most of the achievements will be awarded to you by simply completing or coming first in the races in Career Mode, and since there are 5 difficulty modes and the achievements don't specify which one you need to use to get the award, anyone should be able to snag them. Other achievements include buying all the vehicles, driving in excess of 500 and 1000 miles, and completing a Championship, which is just a series of races one after another.

   Speaking of the difficulty levels, the developers have done a good job in ensuring that almost anyone should be able to get through races. If you suck like me (and are man enough to admit it!) you'll probably want to start out on the second lowest level, and then eventually work your way up. Another good inclusion in DiRT is that after every race, your time is uploaded to the leader boards, so you can see how you fared against other people from around the world. I know this isn't exactly revolutionary, but it is still a nice inclusion, and it's quite humbling when you see that you've been beaten by, say, 30,000 people. I'd say it's about 6000 percent more effective than Jesus at teaching you a little humility.

All right, time for a bath

   If there are any particular downsides to the game, it would be that there are so many races to get through all up that it can become a little repetitive after a while. Much like no RPG fan wants to go through too many battles in a row, once you spend more than 8 hours going through career mode, you might start to get sick of going through race after race, and some tracks will pop up too frequently for your liking.

   Also, once you're finished with Career mode, there's not much else to do, apart from entering the Championships, trying to beat your personal best times in singles races, or going online and racing other people. While that may sound like a good set of options, after many hours with the game, they don't sound quite as exciting. So while the game definitely offers plenty of tracks, and enough cars to keep you satisfied, it would be nice if it also provided some beefier incentives to keep playing. Finally, the game (as may be expected) feels slower on the whole than some other racing games that are out: instead of careening through traffic you're often alone on a mountain path. It's still exciting enough to play, but keep in mind that it's definitely a different experience.

   That said, DiRT has a lot to offer. If you're a rally fan, than this purchase should be a no-brainer, and the game's accessibility means that even new fans like me can easily jump aboard. It doesn't revolutionize the driving genre, but still impresses on multiple levels. A definite winner.

       ... Travis Whipps