rec.autos.simulators

The intro is great looking, but a waste for those downloading.
It makes sense for CD dist as this has been mentioned to be.

Well lets touch on a few points I haven't seen listed:
Where in the ***y HELL is the handbrake!?!  I was stunned!
Control is nice, but I've never seen a rally car do a
corkscrew jump and land on its wheels. Twice.  Yes, no
damage is fun, but silly!  My first run I think I flipped
9? 10 times or so.  Time of 14:30somthing.  The hood er,
bonnet view was beautiful, but the high ditch sides make
using the treeline and pre-turns very tough.  I like the
fact that there are a great many views.

"Hookup" with the Seat (the only car) is a bit silly.
5 seconds of front wheel spin? In second as well?
Where's the manual gear shift?!   Engine noise drowns
out the co-drivers instructions, and gravel and dirt
noises are even louder.  I like the grating skid-plate
sounds when attempting to high-center the car.  

there seem to be plenty of choices for car based
on the closing screens.  I'm dieing to run some.
I wonder if the Civic is a CVT in automatic mode?
(some guys from Honda R&D N.A. run a civic cvt here
in a F2-like class called Group-2)

My second run, I tried not to do 90 the entire time.
I held back to a more relaxed 60-70mph.  I noticed
it was still VERY VERY tough to drive bonnet view.
So I switched to 3rd person outside the car.
13:34 hooked up with 2 rolls.  

Playing a bit more with the physics engine I noticed
that the rear is quite realistic at low(er) speeds.
However things get very strange at high speeds, and
the car acts less like a rally car and more like a
"skipping stone" thown across a pond.  I was able to
"skip" the car backwards across an entire field. NOT
too realistic.

The graphics on both my Voodoo2 and my Matrox Mil. G200
(had a hard time convincing the game NOT to do 3dfx)
both look very good and its easy to call this the best
_looking_ rally sim ever.  

Do they build perfect, unbreakable wooden fences in the UK?
The crowds are still dumb-looking, but expected.

Things I hope to goodness they add/are in:

-Car setup, tire selection and gearing changes
-handbrake!!!
-damage (lots of talk about this already on other threads)
-bonus hidden cars (hey, why not?)
-reverse burnouts are exactly the same as forward? Uhm.. gearing?
-Gear sounds were un-rally-like.  No straight cut loud gears, but the
"crunch" of the shift was there.
-joystick and wheel support so everyone will shut up about it
customizable polygon car models. Hell, customizable helmet models.
-less damn lens flare!  since when do ALL ralleyists wear
round glasses?
-ghosted multiplayer like CMR had.  Not that awful multiplayer
they had for IRC.

So my times as they stand:

1-14:30something
2-13:34
3-DNF (my brother got annoyed and made me put on headphones)
4-rebooted (damn that power cable got under my chair and I kicked it)
5-12:41
6-10:07
7- was on track for an 8min. but got backwards 1/2 way at the dry
ditch on the left, and the car became "stuck" restarted.
8-11:something

So, drop a note and tell me what YOU folks out there think.
As presented (for whatever reasons) this is NOT a sim.  Rather
it is a fairly good arcade game that is much better than any
current offerings.  Rating: for those that ralleye, buy it
have fun.  For those who love racing sims, avoid as you'll
whine too much.  Inbetween?  Check it out yourself.
7 out of 10.  with more in-game options, or any, it would
have gotten an 8.

Looking forward to the full game:
Ed

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"Trying to explain computers to a layman is like trying to

As in real life there`s no point in keeping the wheels spinning -
you`ll never get traction. Because the contol is digital for the demo
the throttle is either all the way open or idle - no in between. With
analog controls (next demo hopefully) you`ll be able to engage first
at mid throttle and thus not engage an endless spin.

Remember the footage of that white Escort doing a flip (from  a
seemingly level surface)  in the intro movie for irc ? Kinda reminds
me of this game.  

The car does feel slightly light although these are country tracks
and you`re going in excess of 100 mph in places so it`s not too hard
to imagine the car taking flight going over ditches or large humps.
When you do loose it the *** of getting thrashed all over the
place is great and you really feel the solididy of those walls and
trees. Top marks to Europress for this.

Anyway, for me the game has succeeded in re-creating the sheer terror
that is rally driving through this type of terrain at such incredible
speed. Reminds me a hell of a lot of TV WRC coverage.  

by a long shot. CMR is just a high res PSX port. Very cartoon like. On
an off topic I hope codemasters develop the PC version of CMR2 first
this time.

Yeah, much agreed. This dissapointed me a lot and really harkens back
to RAC championship. Looks almost like they just lifted the same
graphics

most of this stuff is in.

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