Reviews// Project CARS

These on-track battles are mostly thanks to Project CARS’ near perfect driver AI. Your opponents act exactly how you would expect them to. They’re not rigidly fixed to a racing line, nor do they drive erratically. They also make realistic mistakes and brake realistically to avoid collisions, which are things that have been missing from driving games for all too long.

Sadly, as much as I’m enjoying Project CARS, it does have its faults. It’s not the best-looking driving game on the market. Both Forza and Driveclub are significantly better-looking and despite not being as pretty it suffers with a lot of slowdown on certain tracks, sometimes to the point where it can affect your racing.

The rolling start races can be hit and miss too, sometimes asking you to suddenly take control on a sharp bend, making it extremely hard to get going without over- or under-steering and writing off a race from the very start.

I also had a lot of sound issues with engine noises glitching out and stuttering which, although it doesn’t effect play, is bloody off-putting.

These can all be patched out and I’m sure developer Slightly Mad Studios is aware of the issues, what with them giving you the options to tweak graphics to improve performance issues (yes, even on the console versions) but as it stands Project CARS is a long way off from being as stable as you’d expect from a finished product, at least on the Xbox One version I was reviewing.

However, this is a game that I really shouldn’t have gotten wrapped up in. I thought I was finished with serious racers and with the genre currently saturated with seemingly more fun driving games this wasn’t even on my radar.

After a few hours though I was locked in. It has the depth required to keep me playing long after my review is finished, with a huge roster of tracks and cars covering different classes from go-karts to touring cars, each of which can be tweaked to improve performance in weather conditions if needed.

Then there’s the online mode. Completely customisable, from asking your guests to run practise laps then qualify for the starting grid to forcing them to drive in cockpit mode, you can also keep things casual by selecting race only and letting them drive the way they way want.

If you’re looking for a game you can filter out restrictions and find the session that you want to play, you're in luck. Personally, I found the practice laps and qualifying to add weight to online races. The build-up creates a tense final showpiece as races feel more important and everyone knows the track and cars well enough to compete at a decent level by the time the green light shines.

There’s still that online problem with collisions. People are dicks, we all know that, so there will always be someone out to ruin your game. But they seem limited here, which I assume is down to trolls not willing to run practice laps for 10 minutes before their inner arsehole can come out to play.

So Project CARS is a game that surprised me a lot. Not only did I enjoy my time with it, it got me interested in a genre of gaming that I had long fell out of love with. It’s just a shame then that its problems get in the way of what would otherwise be a real classic.

Pros:
+ Fantastic AI
+ Minimal Lag Online
+ Huge package to keep you playing for a long time

Cons:
- Frame dropping
- Audio Glitches
- Falls short graphically

SPOnG Score: 8/10