It’ll leave skid marks on more than your screen
Three years ago, Codemasters’s smoothrunning Dirt series hit a filthy great pothole, otherwise known as Dirt: Showdown. Sure, this wasn’t necessarily the greatest disappointment in racing game history—it’s up against Need for Speed: ProStreet and Test Drive Unlimited 2 for that honor—but it marked a low point in the series’s decline from rally simulator to arcade smash-‘emup. So, just as any movie or game franchise still worth a buck inevitably gets a reboot, Codemasters is back to repair the damage.
Dirt Rally is nothing like its predecessor. It harks back to the original Colin McRae Rally games that started the series way back in 1998, focusing squarely on realistic rallying with none of the capture-theflag antics of Dirt 3. If you’re after that kind of arcade experience, Rally won’t get your motor running. This is Codemasters gunning for sim status, and the result is far more like a spiritual successor to 2004’s uncompromising Richard Burns Rally.
What made that game great—as well as early Colin McRae titles—was its ability to convey the butt-clenching tension and merciless nature of stage rallying. Threading a 300-plus BHP, turbocharged missile through twisting loose-surface lanes—often little wider than the car and lined with unforgiving trees and rocks—isn’t a sport with second chances. Consequently, Dirt Rally ditches the flashback gimmickry you got in earlier instalments. Even restarting is discouraged, with a $5,000 event bonus awarded for completing a rally without a restart. And the unrelenting realism doesn’t end there.
WILD RIDES
Slide off course and you’ve got 10 seconds to get back on track. In that time you can try and scramble your own way out of the weeds, or opt to have your car recovered, with a resulting time penalty added. Launch yourself so far into the wilderness that virtual helping hands can’t reach you and that’s it, stage over. Plus, unlike circuit racing where you’re never more than a lap away from your pit crew, crashing or even getting a puncture in Dirt Rally means you’ve got no choice but to limp to the end. There’s just one 30-minute service session for repairs in a four-stage rally, and while this can be stretched to an hour, the resulting time penalty is only worth incurring if your chariot is closer to death’s door than Bill Cosby’s career.
With so many roadside hazards and tough penalties for hitting them, using full throttle at speed in all but the most mundane machines is often just a quicker way to end up balls-deep in a bush. And not in a good way. Then, if you throw out the anchors too aggressively, you’ll skid even further into the undergrowth. This may all seem more like motoring masochism, but persevere, listen to your co-driver’s pace notes like your life depends on them, and, with a little luck, you’ll make it to the finish with a sense of achievement that few racing sims can match. Make no mistake, Dirt Rally is tough, but it’s exactly this sense of all-or-nothing pressure that also makes it immensely rewarding and addictive.
No rally game is complete without the Ferrari-powered style icon that is the Lancia Stratos, and along with this you’re treated to its seventies stablemates, like the Ford Escort Mark II and Fiat 131 Abarth. However, you’ll only have enough cash (and probably skill) at the start of your career to pilot an original Mini or Lancia Fulvia, but it doesn’t take long to earn enough for something fruitier.
All the most mental Group B rocketships are on offer, plus several rear-wheel drive cars from the period, such as the Lancia 037, Ford Sierra Cosworth, and E30 BMW M3. Nineties Group A options aren’t quite so well represented, with just the Escort Cosworth, Lancia Delta Integrale, and a 1995 Subaru Impreza to choose from. If Codemasters add the legendary Castrol Celica GT-Four and Tommi Mäkinen’s Lancer Evo VI, plus more retro metal like the Renault 5 Maxi Turbo, and maybe an Alpine A110, then Dirt Rally’s car selection would be sublime.
But it’s the rally locations that need addressing first. What’s included is well modeled and immersive, but we need quantity as well as quality. You’ve got Greece for gravel stages, the tarmac and ice of the Monte Carlo rally, Germany’s countryside backroads, plus damp and muddy forest tracks in Wales. It’s a good variety, but many of the stages are simply reverse runs of others, and even more fun could be had with the addition of Finland’s super-fast dirt or an all-snow rally like Sweden.
RACE FEVER
If you’re after more variety, there’s always different disciplines, like rallycross or hill climbing. The latter is restricted to just a single venue, but it is the best: Pikes Peak, with both the classic dirt and the present paved configuration. Three cars are available, and Codemasters hasn’t messed about. There’s the fearsome Peugeot 205 T16, 405 T16, and Audi S1 Quattro, each in full-on Pikes Peak spec, wearing wings outrageous enough to make a Plymouth Superbird look subtle.
Rallycross currently includes two tracks: one in Sweden, the other in England. In a break from the eighties Group B theme, your choice of wheels are the bang up-todate Ford Fiesta, VW Polo, and Peugeot 208, packing over 550BHP a piece. Racing is close and aggressive with a minimum of three opponents, plus there’s a longer joker lap in every race to spice things up. Missing this will get you a time penalty, as will corner-cutting, and while rubbin’s definitely racing, ramming will damage your ride, and as always, repairs don’t come easy. It’s exhilarating, with the only slight criticism being that there are only four opponent skill settings. Once you’ve nailed each course, even the Very Hard difficulty isn’t quite hard enough.
Of course, as Dirt Rally is still Early Access, there’s scope for tweaks as well as extra cars and locations. But what you get now is as polished as any fully fledged Codemasters title, with very few glitches. Graphical quality isn’t quite on a par with Project Cars, but the visuals are easy on the eye and also your rig, with a single GTX 960 able to run most settings maxed out at 2560x1440 while maintaining 40-plus fps.
However, what’s most impressive is the superb handling, stage design, and a car line-up that’ll give most gear heads a stiff shifter. Dirt Rally may still be a work in progress, but it’s already more than just a return to form. It’s quite possibly the most accomplished rally sim ever. BEN ANDREWS