What is welcome however, is DiRT Rally 2.0’s stunning presentation. Not game-breaking, but not welcome either. There were a few times where RaceNet was struggling and this would essentially lengthen loading and saving times considerably, as DiRT Rally 2.0’s continually attempted to connect. Thankfully, it connected a few minutes later and everything was fine, but that wasn’t the only time it was an issue. I literally could not continue without RaceNet’s say-so, even in single player. After a stage, RaceNet could not connect and the game would only give me the option to quit, restart or make another connection attempt. However, it can cause problems while playing through this game’s career mode, as I discovered. I could go into the “evils” of online servers in single player games, but this is not the time. I wish the same could be said for RaceNet in general, which unfortunately runs all through DiRT Rally 2.0. The servers were never an issue either, keeping the action smooth during every race. Honestly, it made me realise just how far I have to go in terms of my abilities, but I had so much fun that it didn’t matter that I was placing no higher than third place. You’re always connected to Codemasters’ RaceNet servers, so anything you do in a rally is added to online leaderboards, but if you want to test yourself against real players, face-to-face (well, sort of), then Rallycross provides the perfect arena. Luckily, that’s where online multiplayer can help. Maybe even the best part of the game, or rather it would be without the AI issues. Perhaps even more frustratingly, Rallycross is actually fantastic at times. In many ways, it makes it all the more frustrating that the Rallycross AI has the ability to spoil the experience. In all fairness, when you’re in a rally and aren’t having to fend off the AI, the only problems with the gameplay are down to your own skill level. There’s a feeling of pure exhilaration as you barrel down a high speed dirt road, back end sliding around flat rights and lefts, kicking up clouds of dust in your wake. You’ll be too engrossed in the action, trying to keep your car away from that tree that wants you to come say “Hi”. The thing is, when DiRT Rally 2.0 is at its best, you’ll forget about these issues. If you’re on the inside of that bend, you won’t have yourself a fun time. Codemasters’ racers normally have realistic and fair AI, so this makes it extra hard to accept, especially when the first corner in Sweden is ripe for having your bonnet crumpled and your engine smashed. The AI is incredibly aggressive, to the point that it will happily shunt you into barriers that can and will ruin your race. Unfortunately, this can be a problem, through no fault of your own, during the otherwise excellent Rallycross races. Instead you’ll have a limited number of restarts available to you over the entire rally, so you really have to be careful. To make matters worse in these situations, the signature rewind function pioneered by Codemasters hasn’t been a part of the more recent DiRT outings and it certainly isn’t present here. Or, if you have the luck I had, you’ll be unsighted by foliage coming into a corner and find yourself in a losing battle with a metal gate. And if you turn into a corner at the wrong angle, you may well learn how clothes feel in a tumble dryer as your car rolls into the bushes. Your butt-hole will be able to crush diamonds. The roads are almost claustrophobically narrow at times, requiring pinpoint accuracy in the control of your car, which isn’t easy at the best of times, never mind when you’re pushing 100mph and suddenly find yourself hitting a technical section with slow, tight corners and a cliff edge on one side. This is a rally simulation, which comes with the same challenges those real drivers face, just without the potential consequences of injury and death. Unlike DiRT 4, which made the cars more manageable and the tracks wider, DiRT Rally 2.0 offers no such friendliness. The Historic class isn’t going to go easy on you or anything, but the Fulvia is slower and heavier, giving you a slightly better chance of keeping the car on the right path instead of wrapped around the same tree as the Mitsubishi. My career started in Argentina, but rather than strapping me into the driving seat of a fire-spitting Mitsubishi Evo and pointing me at the nearest tree, DiRT Rally 2.0 put me at the wheel of a more sedate Lancia Fulvia. Thankfully, despite a complete lack of tutorial or proper introduction, Codemasters knows how to ease players into its games even when they’re as brutal as this one. When your very first rally is a night stage, you can’t help but think that DiRT Rally 2.0 wants you to know that it isn’t playing around.
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