Review for GRID. Game for PC, PlayStation 4, Steam and Xbox One, the video game was released on 11/10/2019
I've never faced a race weekend in Havana, the penniless team principal wanted a driver hoping to pay him with a few pennies and some advertising campaigns. I've been on foot since last season and that fool knows that I have a craving for running. As soon as I arrived and there are already problems, at the end of free practice the ECU sent the engine into recovery and it seems that there is a transfer of coolant in the cylinders that will force the team to change the engine, making me skip qualifying. The race is going to be difficult, everyone is in high gear and there will be a lot of elbowing in the fray. The positive thing is that here you can find excellent cigars at reasonable prices, this Montecristo Edmundo smokes well, I hope I can smoke it all and maybe let us escape a drop of rum and a piece of chocolate, other than energy drink ...
As soon as you start the game and watched the introductory movie, you quickly realize that Codemasters in the development by GRID he did things right and he intends to throw us into the fray immediately. There are some races to face immediately, different disciplines to practice with the modes and controls. The atmosphere that reigns is the one that the whole series carries with it from the beginning, that is unbridled fun that winks at simulation. Once you get to the main menu, clean and tidy, you can access the various sections and the different modes made available. You can try single events, the multiplayer mode and, of course, the career mode which we will analyze in detail.
The game has as testimonial Fernando Alonso, world-class rider twice F1 World Champion with Renault Sport, winner of the 24 Hours of Le Mans on Toyota GAZOO Racing and 24 Hours of Daytona in the Wayne Taylor Racing Cadillac. the racing legend's contribution was not purely marketing, but worked very closely with the development team to ensure that racing on the track was tight-knit, realistic and unpredictable.
Let's say right away that GRID is a title in its own right, approaching it as an arcade will send you to heavy disappointments and, at the same time, if you are a simulation purist it would be better if you orientate yourself elsewhere, the reason will be explained to you later. What Codemasters has decided to make is a product that does not force the player to raise or lower their approach or driving level, but that it goes to sew on the tastes of the player himself.
The options regarding the level of difficulty are in fact perfectly "scalable": you can customize everything, from cosmetic damage to mechanical damage, with the addition of "fatal" damage or damage that, if it occurs, forces you to immediately withdraw from the race. The driving aids can be deactivated or adjusted, you decide how much the GRID difficulty level will affect your path on the track. In partial consolation, we can tell you that it is possible to "rewind" the time to remedy an error.
Codemasters has also given space to fans of tuning, even if, however, we are not faced with a real simulator. You can manage elements such as the adjustment of the suspension or the gear ratio, which we also recommend doing since on some cars we have found a non-optimal basic ratio. Cars react well to adjustments, though the absence of the sensation of "weight" of the car will make simulation lovers turn up their noses. The physics of the game is all in all good and the collisions are much more realistic than other titles in circulation which would claim to be more simulation.
Assault rookie
Like every chapter of the GRID series, the heart of the game is obviously the Career mode. We will be called starting from the lower categories, unlocking the various events from time to time in order to climb the rankings. GRID is a game that will often ask you to adapt your driving style because there are various categories, from touring cars to Nascar, passing through the road, the old racing cars of the past, the single-seaters and the most powerful prototypes.
For those who love the limit, Codemasters has implemented the category called “Time Attack”, with real extreme racing cars to look for lap times. It is in this analysis that the very little arcade side of GRID emerges: if there are games in which to get on an off-road vehicle or a supercar, it makes no difference, here you will have to be careful and understand the reactions of the car from time to time in order to being able to take it to the limit without risking too much. The problem, however, is given by the main mechanics that Codemasters has particularly taken care of: the brawl.
Despite the presence of the "quick qualification", or the possibility of making a quick lap before the race to establish the starting position, you will often start from the center of the grid, if not from the back. Nothing serious, you will say, however it is not quite like this: being categories in which the cars are all alike, you cannot hope to make a difference thanks to the notorious "technical gap" (leveled in reality with the famous "balance of performance" by some motor categories), you will have to do it yourself, taking risks and often throwing your heart over the obstacle.
To further increase the difficulty is the fact that the races are often run on short circuits, with a few laps available and there is no time to manage a comeback. If you want to progress and level up, know that the game system awards you points based on how spectacular you are driving: Take the trails, overtake inside and outside, indulge yourself and profit from a spectacular and effective driving. As soon as the green light goes off then, down to the tablet!
A question of nemesis ...
Codemasters introduced the element to GRID "Nemesis", a game mode that is triggered when you use a little too strong manners towards an opponent. He is in front of you, you are in the middle of the group and you decide to pull off an “optimistic” break, inevitably ending up on him. If you have activated the mechanical damage in addition to the aesthetic ones, be prepared to have car management problems from that moment on, but just to add some spice, you will have to deal with an opponent who will try to do everything to take revenge on the I face immediately. The best solution in these cases will be to stay away from the nemesis: try to put a gap and maybe other drivers between you and him, because here the revenge is not consumed cold, but hot like the exhaust pipes of your cars.
Forget about the classic "trains" you may be used to with other titles of the genre, the AI by GRID is dynamic and decidedly spectacular: the opponents only think about doing their race, they pull away and move to prevent you from finding openings under braking; from this point of view we are faced with a really interesting and fun title to play. To compensate for the nemesis game mechanics, you can enjoy the cooperation of your teammate (green dot on the race radar), asking the team to make him take an offensive or defensive attitude, in case you need to send him to attack the opponent to keep him busy and maybe make him lose points, or to make him close all the doors to let him act as a stopper, allowing you to accumulate advantage.
In addition to the complexity of AI, there is also and above all to pay attention to penalty imposed by the race direction: repeatedly going off the track, cutting corners or committing infractions will cause penalties in terms of time to be added at the end of the race, with consequent change to the ranking. Do you remember when we talked about the arcade approach at the beginning of the article? Here, if you are a lover of the classic "shore guide", change your approach as soon as possible because GRID he will leave you no way out.
Graphics and Audio
The graphics sector of GRID is good even if it does not represent anything exceptional. The graphics engine used is the latest version of EGO Engine. The details of the circuits are not well cared for, even if the views of the city circuits are really special. I polygonal models of cars are appreciable, especially from inside the passenger compartment where each indicator works and is perfectly legible. In the presence of aesthetic damage, the deformation of the bodywork is somewhat reminiscent of the "rubbery" effect already seen in titles of past years, while the traces of dirt on the bodywork are well done.
The races at sunset and in the evening, offer instead splendid play of light like the low sun on the horizon that disturbs while driving and the lights around the track, especially on street circuits. During the wet races, in the most excited phases of the brawl, it is possible to witness some drop in frame rate which, however, does not affect the gaming experience. The audio compartment on the other hand is up to the situation, the noise of the engines differs greatly depending on the type (a V8 engine is clearly distinguishable from a 2-liter turbo, for example), not to mention all the sound effects produced by racing cars, such as backfires in the exhaust or squeaks of the suspension. The off-screen voice of the race commentator is also suggestive, alternating with that of the technical director in the garage.
Multiplayer
At the time we tried the game in its final version, the multiplayer mode objectively amazed both for its stability and for the almost total absence of lag. Codemasters GRID servers are already quite stable, so you won't find it hard to have fun online already on day one. At a purely online dynamic level, it is possible to play a Quick Match where you will enter the first available room, or a Private Match where we can set everything according to our preferences.
A not inconsiderable detail is that Unlike other games, GRID does not have a completely unrelated multiplayer mode compared to the single player mode: to participate in the various online races, in fact, you must have the required car (according to the category), or you will have to buy it with the virtual currency of the game. So make sure you have done a good number of career events, so that you can have a certain number of cars or have the money to buy them.
… After all, it wasn't too bad. Finishing on the podium starting from the back, with a car put back together in the night, is a good result. The penniless told me he'll deduct the cost of the bumper from my pay, but it doesn't matter ... I had a good time, that bullet son Joshua Cooper made it hard for me with his Ford Focus. Making the podium is always worthwhile, if only for the sparkling wine ... Who knows when I will be able to drive again, but never mind: what matters is being ready when the phone rings ...
Finally something new, one would say. Finding yourself playing a sparkling and unpredictable racing title, where one race is never the same as another, is a delightful surprise. Although the graphics sector has been a bit sacrificed, it is a fully tolerable defect in the face of a really high playability that will keep you glued to the screen for some time. For some, the 60 car models available at launch may seem few, do not worry because there is fun and it is a fleet of cars in our opinion hyper selected and absolutely up to the situation, with some goodies like the Alfa Romeo 155 TS Touring and the Ferrari 330 P4 GT. Once again, Codemasters with GRID has hit the mark.
► GRID is a racing-Sport type game developed and published by Codemasters for PC, PlayStation 4, Steam and Xbox One, the video game was released on 11/10/2019
