[HEADING=1]Sub/jective Reviews[/HEADING]
I am starting a new review series that I am going to do every holiday/time off from education. The series will be split into segments, where I discuss the different aspects(gameplay, visuals, audio, story, multiplayer(if any)) of a game in their own given category. Most notably, I will provide what I find to be an objective assessment of those different sections. What this means however, is that I will provide any objective information that I can, which will usually be limited to a list of features, a bug/glitch count during my playthrough and a run-down of the options. I will take both the subjective portion of the game and the objective into account during the final assessment. I will not provide scores, as I am opposed to that idea to begin with, as it causes readers to glaze over key information in any review.
Why am I doing this? Many people are clamouring for game reviews to be more 'objective', so I'll address that wanting, if only to highlight exactly how limited true objectivity is in application to reviewing.
For the time being, I will focus on indie games. I am open to suggestions, so long as the games are available on PC/Steam and so long as they aren't something that has been talked about too much, as I don't believe that I will add anything significant to that discussion.
Why am I doing this? Many people are clamouring for game reviews to be more 'objective', so I'll address that wanting, if only to highlight exactly how limited true objectivity is in application to reviewing.
For the time being, I will focus on indie games. I am open to suggestions, so long as the games are available on PC/Steam and so long as they aren't something that has been talked about too much, as I don't believe that I will add anything significant to that discussion.
Critique is encouraged and appreciated. If you see something you'd like to be added/improved, post ahead!
The PC that the games will be played on:
[li]Intel i5 3470 @ 3.2Ghz Quad Core Processor[/li]
[li]Kingston Hyper-X 2x4GB DDR3 RAM @ 1337Mhz[/li]
[li]Zotac Nvidia Geforce GTX 670 2GB[/li]
[li]Acer 23.6" Monitor 1920x1080 @ 60Hz[/li]
[HEADING=1]Dirt 3[/HEADING]
[HEADING=2]Intro[/HEADING]
With Dirt Rally's recent release, I've been meaning to get back into that particular brand that Codemasters used to specialise in; arcade-simulation racing games. I still have fond memories of Dirt 2, with its, at the time, impressive graphics and physics, as well as its varied tracks and modes. Between it and Grid, Codemasters were a household name in the PC racing sphere when it came to scratching that particular itch: having some of the handling and depth of full on simulation games, whilst still retaining the moment to moment satisfaction that you get from arcade games(namely bolting down a strait at irresponsible speeds).
However, for one reason or other, Codemasters soon began dropping the ball. Grid 2 certainly looked prettier, but the handling was considerably more arcade-y, with a lot of unnecessary fluff being added on top of it. The new social media metagame that was used to replace the original's team management mechanics certainly was a strange choice. Instead of you racing in order to acquire reputation as well as money, 2 replaced it with a "celebrity progress bar" that certainly dates the game and makes tournament restrictions feel even more arbitrary. This was also followed by the seeming abandonment of Dirt as a franchise, with the gimmicky Dirt Showdown, in lieu of a much more eagerly anticipated Dirt 4 that fans wanted.
Dirt 3 sits at the precipice of Codemasters eventual descent. It was one of the last games they had made in that original Dirt tradition, but it also featured some strange additions that were symptomatic of what was to come. Thankfully, with the aforementioned release of Dirt Rally, perhaps we'll see a return to form for the developers, but it is nonetheless something that is worthy of examination. Driving sims have only recently come back into prominence, mostly due to the Steam Early Access programme, as well as Kickstarter. No doubt, Codemasters saw this as an opportunity to try and break into the market again, but it still remains strange how it fell stagnant in the first place. Games like Grid, Dirt 2 and Blur are all fondly remembered.
This review will take a look at Dirt 3 and whether or not it truly was instrumental in the decline of the sub-genre as well as how well it holds up today.
[HEADING=2]Story[/HEADING]
The campaign this time around is much more bare bones than before. Dirt 2 had a lot of effort put in to truly try and sell the X-games atmosphere, with the main menu being rendered in engine as a trailer, tournaments being plastered on walls as posters for you to join. Your previous vehicle was on display outside your trailer, as well as the latest event you participated in. Bright green with heavy black and white outlines was plastered absolutely everywhere, as well as the 20 something "yooooo duuuuuuuude" commentators who congratulated you on every victory whilst the 2008 Kerrang playlist rattled off in the background. It did get grating after a while and certainly felt tacky at others, but there was genuine effort being put in to try and inject this game with as much personality as possible, however obnoxious it may have been.
Conversely, Dirt 3 is very minimal. You go from season to season as a non-descript upstart driver being guided by another crew of professional millenials, however this time around, they stick out even more because the supporting elements aren't there any more. The interface this time around is a crisp blue, but there's no more trailer park menu, or even that much distinct music anymore. Tournaments are presented as floating polygons, which once you complete, are tinted gold. It is significantly cleaner, but at the same time, it feels a lot more hollow than what we had before.
Another thing that may fill people with unease is the omission of "Colin McRae" from the box title, because the Rally legend's presence has completely disappeared. You could make a case for Dirt 2 being the same, since it barely did anything to honour the driver, but it still had a McRae world series challenge which felt appropriately graceful to celebrate the man's skill as a driver. Dirt 3 on the other hand, shares a similar problem with Grid 2, in that it tries
to cling onto trending fads, in this case, YouTube and Ken Block. After every race, one of your co-ordinators will spout cringeworthy lines such as "That was awesome! You should upload it and show it off on YouTube!" as a thinly veiled promotion of the game's social media features that I never used. Perhaps back in the day, this was considered neat, but with the rising tide of games badgering you to connect your social media accounts to them(most annoyingly so, from personal experience, FFXIII Lightning Returns) it certainly wasn't something that made me want to break myself out of the game even more to fiddle around with.
I also mentioned Ken Block, who has supplanted Colin as the poster child in this game. Every season of tournaments includes at least one Gymkhana event, adopted from Block's freestyle driving videos of the same name[footnote][/footnote]. For anyone who has ever seen these displays, they are quite entertaining, but would probably be quite annoying in a video game, since they're all about spectacle. You can't exactly expect players to gracefully drift around a lamppost on their first go, so frustration will quickly ensue when you realise that Gymkhana is just a display. Thankfully, Codemasters realised this issue, and have instead made the modes score attack sandboxes, which, by themselves are a fun distraction, but when they're one of the primary selling points on the back of the box, something definitely feels off.
Overall though, the campaign isn't alienating enough that it would prevent someone who enjoyed the games in the series from getting into 3. At most, it is annoying, but nowhere near as divisive or as obnoxious as Dirt 2, probably due to the glaring difference in effort being put in to the atmosphere of the game.
[HEADING=2]Gameplay[/HEADING]
The crux of the Dirt series' signature driving remains largely the same as it did in Dirt 2, with a few extras added to inject just a bit more depth to the handling. It's still just as satisfying to barrel down a Rally track, carefully handling past hazards and hairpins alike, whilst pebbles and dirt rattle off your windshield in direct proportion to the roar of your engine. There's something innately primal about Rally racing as a whole, to drive somewhere where cars are generally unfavoured and still come out on top, and that still remains as satisfying here as it always had. The additions include driving assists that you can turn off to add an extra layer of challenge, such as brake lock prevention or traction control. I went through the entire game with them off, and I have to say that they do make handling a lot more interesting. The series has always had incredible detail put into its physics in order to truly sell the idea that you are in a moving vehicle loosely assembled from different parts that somehow power together to get you through to the end, but with the new additions, it really does feel even more like you're physically wresting control of the car in order to win. There's a lot more to compensate for around every turn and every jump. Even a small incline can easily turn your car over if you're not paying attention, and proper brake timing is even more crucial this time around.
In terms of the pure driving though, there isn't much change. It's still as fun, as visceral and I would even go as far to say as meditative as it was before. It's just a joy to take a Subaru Impreza across the Finnish country side and just drive for races on end. The most spectacular changes however, are in the game modes themselves. The most disappointing part of Dirt 3 is that Rally has been significantly toned down as a mode. Whereas Dirt 2's tracks comprised of 5 minute tracks on average, those are only the lengthiest courses in 3. It is disparaging to say the least, because the driving is still as excellent as it was before, but now the most fun form of it has been diluted somewhat. To Codemasters' credit, the tracks are diverse and interesting, but there's simply not enough variety to go around to feasibly justify these cuts. The other modes also aren't particularly enticing anymore. Trailblazer used to be a nightmarish Iron Man mode run across a massive track, easily lasting up to 10 or even 15 minutes a piece, where you were forced to go at speeds of up to 150mph around Utah countryside and winding Chinese roads, enabling you to enjoy the close brush
with danger every time you came close to the edge of a sharp incline as well as the desperate struggle against time. Instead, they rely more on basic handling as well as Grid-style road racing, on top of the fact that they have been significantly reduced in length and spectacle.
Land Rush has been completely omitted in this installment, so you no longer get to play the map against the enemy AI in a race. Trucks, pickups and dune buggies are now used solely in Rally Cross events, which do feature a lot of jumps and aggressive terrain, but just like with Trailblazer, no longer impress you quite as much as they did back in Dirt 2. Rally Cross is equally uninspired, with a lot of tracks being recycled from Dirt 2(most notably the Shibuya track, one which I personally don't like all that much due to its small size) and with the escalation of challenge being presented as you having to race more consecutive laps through the progression of your career.
Then there is arguably the most baffling mode out there, Gymkhana. As mentioned earlier, Gymkhana works on paper as a distraction, but it is put on a pedestal in Dirt 3 far too often. Every championship requires you to play a Gymkhana track in order to win it, and the initial novelty soon wears thin. The problem with the game mode lies more in the fact that the Dirt driving model isn't properly cut out for score attack game modes. It always walked the line between arcade and simulation, so prolonged focus on something as arcadey as Gymkhana brings out the biggest problems with this hybrid model. The cars are simply too weighty and aggressive in order to work continuously with precision drifting,donut-ing and spinning. They are much more favoured towards improvisation and moment to moment decision making, because that is essentially what the Dirt series was all about up to this point. Rally is in the heart of the franchise, so putting such importance onto Gymkhana is more than a bit irksome. The game simply does not agree with its being forced to work with, so you will frequently end up restarting Gymkhana events just so you can max out your score as perfectly as possible because you made that one tiny mistake of braking way too early. The time constraints for these modes are very tight, averaging at about a couple of minutes every time, so you will inevitably be restarting the event several times if you want to win, which is incredibly aggravating. If you screw up in a Rally event, and smash up one of your wheels, you can still win with the right amount of aggression, concentration and handling. If you screw up in Gymkhana, you have to start a stunt chain all over again under what are incredibly arbitrary event rules.
[HEADING=2]Objective Assessment:[/HEADING]
Fully rebindable keys, works fine with keyboard and mouse. Has controller support as well as steering wheel support.
[HEADING=2]Visuals[/HEADING]
Dirt 3 isn't a significant evolution over Dirt 2 in terms of graphics. Things are largely around the same as they were before, except maybe with a few post processing trinkets on the side to touch it up in certain areas. Spectators still look like they were smacked with a particularly large paddle at birth, and cars look nice in showcase mode, but in motion, the textures don't particularly hold up in 2015. I would say that it's just a bit disappointing, but considering the fact that 3 wasn't nearly under as much pressure to be a graphical powerhouse as Dirt 2 was at the time. Generally speaking, the game looks fine, and the actual terrain is just as detailed as it used to be. It's a bit difficult to do an apples to apples comparison between the two games, since they both came out within a short amount of time
between themselves, so Codemasters weren't in the best position to put all their bets behind graphics. There's also the matter of aesthetic, with its predecessor going for a much more brighter look that showcased lighting as the primary draw, whereas Dirt 3 goes for a much more dowdy palette this time around.
The few changes or innovations I can examine in this field are that there has been a distinct change in locale. Dirt 3 has gone for a less eclectic set list of climates, primarily featuring northern Europe and thereon cycling between African plains, Monaco and the midwest in the US. As a result, the colours are much less vibrant this time around: there's more woodland than burning sunsets or bright summer days. I can't say if I prefer this change though, since part of the appeal of Dirt 2 was that it presented itself as a much more lively affair. Sure, it was obnoxious and grating sometimes, but there was a charm to that sort of juvenile aesthetic. In contrast, Dirt 3 seems almost reflexively straight in that regard. It is just a personal preference, but I found the tracks here far less memorable or enjoyable to just look at than the Chinese countryside in Dirt 2. The game is still nice to look at within it's respective context, but at the same time, it doesn't do as much to pop out. Snow, rain and gray mountainside aren't particularly appealing, especially not for an engine that was designed initially to show off lighting.
[HEADING=2]Objective Assessment:[/HEADING]
Full suite of graphical options, however there's no FoV slider for the cockpit view.
[HEADING=2]Audio[/HEADING]
The sound design has always been one of the main components for what made the Dirt games so engaging. Codemasters put in meticulous detail to make sure that you are as immersed as possible in the fantasy of being a rally driver, and audio is one part that they never skimp on. The sound of pebbles bouncing off of your windscreen, the sound of burning tires as you drift around on asphalt, the rattle of the roll cage: all of these create an immensely satisfying, immersive and adrenaline infused experience. To their credit, Codemasters decided to expand the array of cars available in this installment, with a healthy range of contemporary models to classics going as far back as the 60s. Each car has a distinct sound to it, from how it accelerates, to how it brakes, with each time period showing equally distinct changes in engine evolution. I wouldn't go as far to say that this is an audiophile's dream, but it certainly manages to hype me up to tear across Norway every time I hear the rev of a Ford Fiesta or a Lancia.
In terms of the music, I won't be able to provide much comment. It didn't stick with me for the first few hours, and I eventually just muted it in favour of playing my own setlist in the background. As far as I know, it isn't quite as divisive as Dirt 2's but it certainly isn't anything spectacular. Music in general for racing games should be something that enhances the experience, but in the Dirt games, it always felt like a colourful distraction rather than central to the fantasy being sold. The games get by on their fantastic sound assets, which are strong enough to tie together the visuals and the handling into a cohesive and enjoyable experience. Dirt 3 is certainly no exception to this.
[HEADING=2]Objective Assessment:[/HEADING]
Separate audio sliders for Master, Voice, Music, SFX, etc.
[HEADING=1]Final Assessment[/HEADING]
Overall, I don't think it would be particularly charitable to call Dirt 3 the initial symptom of Codemasters' downfall. In retrospect, it is closer to a holding pattern than anything else. Everything that was good about the previous game is still here, with some fat trimmed off and some other excisions being made by strange decision making. Gymkhana as a mode unto itself isn't bad, just that it wasn't a particularly successful experiment. In hindsight, it likely led to the lukewarm Dirt Showdown, but I don't see that as something that Codemasters willfully misinterpreted as a good decision. Rather, it feels like they just dropped the ball and didn't know where else to take the franchise. As shown with the release of Dirt Rally, all that was really needed was a pause in order to focus and pool their resources, instead of trying to reliably fight for market control.
And I suppose that that is ultimately what Dirt 3 is. It isn't inherently bad, it is in fact, still quite a good game. Those itching to play a surprisingly good arcade/simulation game still have something good here that should keep them occupied for a good amount of time, as well as those that enjoyed Dirt 2 for the mechanics. But at the same time, that lack of clear direction and fumbling around hovers around Dirt 3 to prevent it from standing out. It is essentially fine, improving slightly in some areas, but sorely lacking in others that would've escalated it to something greater than itself. It is nowhere near the left turn that Grid 2 was or the mishandled apology that was Grid Autosport, but it undeniably played a role in Codemasters eventually just let the franchise sleep for a couple of years. Dirt Rally presents fans of the franchise with hope that this experimental period was something that they finally got out of their systems and that we can now sit down and go back to Rally racing again like we used to enjoy. Dirt 3 still retains a part of that identity, and just doing that is enough for me to consider it in a positive light.
[HEADING=2]Final Objective Assessment[/HEADING]
Good selection of options in regards to audio, visuals and gameplay. Some minor options are lacking, but aren't completely essential. At time of writing, the writer has put in 22 hours, with the price at purchase being ?5.74, roughly equating to a sale maximum value of ?0.26 per hour.
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