DiRT 2 - Impressions

Call me Mr. Late to the Party Man if you must, but I finally got around to picking up DiRT 2 after waiting many months for it to drop in price. Codemasters games seem to take for-fucking-ever. Anyway here is what I think of the game so far.

The first thing that is apparent is that this game is beautiful. This is the game I'd show my friends to convince them to get a 360 or PS3. Take that, Wii! The effects are amazing and everything runs so smoothly. It really is a treat for your eyes. The menus and loading screens are also really slick as well. Everything is very dynamic and it draws you into the experience, even when you aren't racing.

So how does it play? Well I am pretty sure you know what to expect if you played Dirt 1 or Grid. It's definitely an arcade racer, but it requires a lot more finesse than anything like Burnout. The cars feel powerful and graceful yet fragile, not unlike a racehorse. One missed corner or bump in the road could send you flying into the crowd, ending your race and earning you a one way trip to the glue factory. Luckily you can use the replay feature to rewind and start just before your crash.


Now that you understand the basics, it's that time again where I bitch about a little thing that annoys me. In this game it happens to be the voice-overs. Jesus christ, they are annoying. Codemasters went the extra mile for this game to get (I assume) a bunch of professional rally drivers to play themselves in the game. I'm not sure why they felt the need to sell us on the experience even more. I'm driving cars at crazy speeds around a track, you don't need to keep my attention, guys.

What it really comes off as is a lame attempt to appeal to today's youth, who still pay attention to the X-Games I guess. These guys might be great drivers, but voice actors they are not. They all end up sounding really awkward. It wouldn't be so bad if they were only in the tutorial or something, but OH NO! They talk to you for the entire fucking game.


About everything. When you unlock a new car, or enter a new event they will say "Hey it's me Dave Mirra, the professional rally driver. You just unlocked a new car or entered a new event." Thanks Mr. Mirra, I'd be lost without you. Then at the start of the race they give you helpful advice like "Drive fast to win!" or "Don't run into a tree!" Thanks dipshit. They also talk to you over the radio IN YOUR CAR while you are trying to race! There's no escape from these retards.

Sound annoying? You have no idea. But it gets better. You actually have to BEFRIEND these morons in the game to progress. This game has, I shit you not, a menu called Relationships, where it shows your current relationship status with each driver. If you beat them in a race your status is upgraded to Buddies. What does that mean? I have no idea. But if Travis Pastrami calls me on my day off to help him move furniture I am throwing this god damn game out the window.