It’s not DiRT 4. It’s DiRT Rally, and it’s up now on Steam early access.
At release DiRT Rally will include a total of 36 rally stages spread across Monte Carlo, Greece and Wales. We have a total of 17 cars, from 1960s classics right through to modern day machines. As time goes on we’ll be adding more cars, more environments, we’ll be climbing Pikes Peak and going door-to-door around a selection of the best circuits from the 2015 FIA World Rallycross Championship. We’ll also be adding features based on your feedback so be sure to let us know what you’d like to see included in future updates.
The devs are targeting hardcore simmers first, then they will layer in more features for casual/arcade players as development progresses.
It has been far too long since Codie’s made a game with the word Rally in the title. They invoke the Colin McRae series in the description. And it looks like the focus is on point-to-point races. This is VERY exciting.
I played through the daily challenge rally last night and had a blast! Though I am not an expert on rally racing, I know that at the very least this game feels as good as Dirt 3, if not better. I’m overjoyed that they finally cut out all the drifting and car trick driving that was in the past couple games, and are now focused purely on rallying. I really like the idea of daily, weekly, and monthly challenges, and think they fit perfectly in this kind of game. Speaking of challenge, who wants to start a Qt3 league?
Holy crap, the daily event today is ridiculous! Its a long (took me 12 mins), nighttime rally down a big mountain in Greece. As I was playing, it brought memories of my honeymoon when we took a nighttime drive up and down Mt. Hale’akala in Maui (except I was driving much slower then). My rally was going well, when all of a sudden, halfway through the race, I crashed my car, at once damaging BOTH of my headlights. Long story short, the last six minutes of the race were done in almost complete darkness, with only my co-driver and my instincts to guide me. It was truly scary, as one mistep and my car would go flying over a cliff. I managed to finish the race, wiped the sweat off my forehead, and called it a day. I don’t think I’ve had such an intense experience in any other racing game I’ve ever played.
I’m using a used Logitech Driving Force GT. I paid about $60 for it, then spent another $30 on a paddle shifter mod from granturgismo.com. The default paddle shifters are pretty iffy, but a used DFGT is the best value out there for full force feedback, as far as I know. Definitely worth it—the road feel has helped in DiRT as well as road racers like Stock Car Extreme.
You make me want to buy my first Early Access game!
But I’ll wait until it’s finished. Eurogamer just put up an article calling this Codemaster’s first sim. I’ll be playing with a 360 pad, of course. So I hope the controller support is top notch.
So wheel support is in? We have a Logi G25 (one of these days I have to figure out how to fix my Momo with the cord the cat chewed through…) but I don’t think he hooked it up yesterday.
That doesn’t seem quite fair. No, they weren’t Mobil 1 or RBR, but a couple of the CMR games were quite good for a bit milder take on rally racing.
Ok, I made a Qt3 Dirt Rally league that everyone can join. Just search for “Qt3 league” and it should come up. It only has one event so far, with four stages. Lets see who can get the best times!
With lots of penalty time. Were this Rallisport Challenge 2 (my first rally game), I feel like I’d be down a wheel or two by now. I’d gotten pretty good at not trashing my car in DiRT 3. I guess longer stages magnify my mistakes.
I was thinking of putting up a new event every week in the league. Are four stages ok, or should it be shorter/longer? I really wish there was a way to compare times for each individual stage.
BTW, for those who aren’t in the league yet, you should be able to view it here.
There’s a dropdown at the right end of the Standings section where you can pick a stage. Four stages is perfect—about half an hour of driving seems like a pretty good length, although I wouldn’t be against the occasional rally to six events or so.
Is there some trick to playing events, or do you just play the stage and car that the event says?
