[b]TL;DR[/b] Fun retro arcade racer with a great campaign, the retro camera can be a nuisance sometimes but the game accounts for it.
[h3] Up sides [/h3]
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[*] Physics are arcade in a good way and are instinctive to pick up
[*] Huge selection of cars featuring a lot of 'legally distinct' fan favorites from Gran Turismo 2 and their signature liveries, such as the GTS-R Team Oreca and Toyota GT-one
[*] Good selection of tracks, from small city tracks for starter compact cars to 'legally distinct' Monza and Suzuka
[*] Progression is well balanced and most of the prize cars you get are useful to other events
[*] Economy is tight enough to be meaningful but won't force you to grind events for upgrade money, you'll have to if want to buy different cars per class though. Even so, grind is minimal.
[*] Normal difficulty is challenging yet forgiving, which offsets a lot of the disputes you may have with the camera angle
[*] When you car reaches critical health, it'll restore to about 25% (One crash worth usually) if you don't crash further, which is a huge help in preventing DNFs and/or granny drive. May sound silly/handholding, but endurances would be horrid without it. Thank you for the foresight on that one.
[*] Built in support for custom liveries with templates and custom music folder
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[h3] Heads up [/h3]
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[*] The arcade mode, means arcade machine like, so: Modest selection of cars, a timer, Fixed "routes" by difficulty and leaderboards. Both routes are rally instead of GT which looks a little silly now with Rally Edge kek.
It's a very fun contained mode, but if you want to drive that GTS-R you'll have to do it by the career
[*] 100% achievement completion is relatively easy, but "drive 5000km" is longer than it has to, I've finished all major events (WGP championships, Rally tours and endurances) and most of the weekend events, and am only at 3100km atm.
[*] 2 to 4 Player split-screen is operational, if there was any issue back in February when that review got written, it is fixed.
However, it is a little more limited than I'd like; No bots even on 2 player, and you can only pick cars from the garage. Secure some bank beforehand to buy whatever ride your friend finds cool on the fly or just force them into a GTS-R mirror-match I guess.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3788003274
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So, the camera:
I have no intention to change it to a regular one since it'd change the game entirely, but around the 300-400bhp F-Class (99" BTCC Primera) the car starts to outpace the maximum zoom-out, and the cornering becomes to become more predictive than reactive, there's a warning chime to help, but it seems to sound at a fixed pace for all classes, so there's a fair amount of instances like at Monza's parabolica where you want to already be in the move when it sounds, and will have to resort to a in-track to guide like a 150mts sign or a crack on the tarmac... when available.
Its at its worst at the 600-700bhp C-Class, although possibly my fault for buying the GTS-R instead of the sensible options, boi is too free for pesky corners telling him where to go.
[h3] Down sides [/h3]
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[*] Slopes and bumps can be hard to read and add to the 'predict not react' layer of cornering. on the worst offenders, a tap of the brake before entry decides whether you'll take the corner properly or the front-end will lift and send the car off like a RPG.
Can get silly on time-trials since a decent chunk of the leaderboards ends up being high-end cars on low-end tracks.
[*] Lapped cars thinks blue flags mean "The holy night" and its festive light-flashing cars, active hazard to your endurance run.
A NSX almost crashed me out of the lead during 15 rainy laps of Suzuka, yes, it was with the GTS-R.
[*] Miniring. Why the first endurance's at the Miniring of all places.
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In conclusion, game's is not without a few frustrations but the upsides more than cover for the downsides, recommend.
