DiRT

Before we get into the review of the game at hand, there’s a small confession I need to make and it won’t be easy for some of you to digest but well, here it comes nevertheless … I did not like Forza Motorsport 2... There I said it! Now before you go ahead and brand me a heretic you should know that I have nothing against this particular game per say; it’s just that I don’t like racing sims as such and driving around at painstakingly slow speeds just doesn’t appeal to me. So why am I reviewing DiRT? Well for starters we really didn’t have anyone else to review it (Nikhil was busy working on GRAW2) and more importantly, the game isn’t as anal and as Sim-ish (and by Sim I mean Simulator, not the EA game) as I expected. It’s fast, enjoyable, a lot more forgiving than most racing sims on the block and is something casual gamers can sink their teeth into.


The first thing that hits you as soon as you fire up the game is the sleek way in which the game’s main menus have been presented. Once you’re done drooling over the snazzy visuals you can choose to take part in a multitude of events that include Career, Championship, and Rally World and Xbox Live. As the name suggests, Career is the game’s single player campaign that’s divided into eleven tiers and before you can start racing you have Travis Pastrana (freestyle motocross champion) giving you the lowdown on how you can go about handling your DiRT-y career. Each of the above mentioned tiers are divided into a bunch of varied races like Rally, Rallycross, Hillclimb, CORR, Crossover etc. and it’s this variety that keeps the game from becoming monotonous. But unfortunately, a lot of the tracks look and feel the same so I would suggest playing the game at regular intervals (unless you’re a fan of the series). Every race requires you to choose a particular vehicle most suited for that terrain so you’ll be blazing through the desert in your dune buggies while you can tear up the concrete tracks with your Mitsubishi Evo.