"GRID 2" Fun, But Lacking Punch Of The First
So the time has finally come to play the very thing I've been waiting for since I got hooked on the first one. Oh, GRID 2, how you fill that empty void and fuel my adrenaline junkie side.
This game is so Goddamn addictive I told someone I'd help with something in a minute, and half an hour passed by without me looking at the clock. (Whoops!) As time went on it seemed that more and more sadness came upon me while playing GRID 2. The graphics were very nice, yes, but I guess the transfer over to the EGO 3.0 game engine changed some of the things that made the first GRID so unique. I know I had said I had high hopes for this game, but apparently I've got to stop being optimistic about great-looking titles because it's not doing me any good.
Okay, let's try to stay positive for this portion. The start up of GRID 2 has a nice sexy logo like the one above. Then it just tosses you right into a race that features the Ford Mustang, so it kind of gives you the runaround from drifting and how to rewind to the part that you may have crashed at to save the race you were working on. Like I said: the graphics are much better than they were in the first GRID, and the new style of the garage that you can look at your race selection is pretty awesome. The other cool thing they included some ESPN videos after beating each section where they're talking about W.S.R. (World Series Racing), which would be pretty awesome if it was real. (I guess the only thing that gets close to it is the X-Games tour with the Rally Cross racing.)
With that said, here comes the negative. I'm sad to say that the drifting that you had in the first GRID has gone bye bye. I think the setup that they were trying to go for was something toward Forza or Need For Speed. This really breaks my heart, as it went from the amazing drift scores that I could obtain in the first game to seem like I'm attempting to fish tail the back of a shark on dry land. Now another thing that seems to be a disappointment is at the end of each race it says "Fans Earned." Well excuse me, GRID 2, but I think I'd like to have back the sound of money and cash registers in the background from the first one. If they wanted to have both it would have made way more sense. Don't get me wrong: I like the concept of getting fans, but I felt that there more enjoyment and fulfillment when you earned the money and was able to figure out if you wanted to buy a brand new car or go on Ebay and try to buy the car for cheaper.
I guess the cool thing is that you can do is Promo and Vehicle Challenges to earn the cars, it just doesn't seem as fun. Another thing that didn't make much sense is the sponsor setup they brought over. Yes, I like to have the sponsor part, but it seems that they had a lot of the sponsors have the same kind of missions in order to get more fans. Beforehand GRID had a setup of picking the sponsor, and they had to finish the race first in order to get X amount of dollars. To compare it to GRID 2, where they would say beat such and such racer on such and such course, it makes that sponsor only good for one specific race. Another issue that I had was that you can go back on the timeline, but it would've been much easier if they kept the menu from the first GRID, where you had a three-to-four tier level setup where you can pick in between the three countries to do either drifting, touring and everything else they provided.
FINAL THOUGHTS:
Now as sad as it was with the negative aspect of GRID 2, I still found myself working on beating the game. I'm hoping that Codemasters may patch the game to bring it back to the drifting like before, but it's not likely. However I can plead with the people who worked on this game to please not try to make your game features like Forza. Go back to the drawing board, see what you can do to bring back the awesomeness that you did right in the first GRID, and put it towards the next game in the series (depends on if it's popular enough to actually create a third GRID).
GRID 2 still has a pulse, though. Its graphics and other fun aspects of the games really make it awesome, but in the long run it's hard to see myself going back to it time and time again like I did with original GRID. Sorry, Codemasters, but I need more drifting!
PROS:
- Very welcoming game
- Graphics have improved immensely
- Garage setup is a bit nicer
- World Series Racing is awesome!
CONS:
- What happened to the proper, lengthy drifting!??!
- Codemasters trying to turn game into Forza or Need For Speed
- Money part is gone!
- Can't buy cars
- Sponsor setup is now pointless in the game
FINAL GRADE: 7.4 (out of ten)
