Colin McRae: DIRT

And with all the variety in event types, it should pretty much go without saying that you'll be seeing all manner of vehicles as you make your way to rally stardom. The usual spread of Lancers, Subarus and the smaller rally cars of today is a decent start, with plenty of classic rally cars, prototypes, trucks, buggies and more besides all just waiting to be unlocked. Each has its own unique feel and as well as the basic stats that give you a rough idea of which is best for any given job, you can call in an analyst for a more detailed description with a touch of a button. This feature is reprised elsewhere in the game, with assistants being able to talk you through a complex stage or help you work out which aspects of a car to tweak or repair between stages, meaning you can go it alone or have the benefit of expert advice if you so desire.

It isn't just the individual cars that feel different here, though, and as you speed from mud to tarmac or leap across sand dunes, you'll notice a huge change in each surface. The physics model means that most courses require you to adapt several times per circuit as you hit each new surface - fail to react to the fact that a long concrete stretch suddenly branches off into a muddy bend and you can expect to be overtaken as you spin out and do untold damage to your car in the process. Damage modelling too is wonderful and while slight scrapes will certainly make their mark, anything larger will see bodywork twist and buckle before smashing off altogether. Depending on your difficulty level, damage can have anything from a negligible to a catastrophic effect on performance and while you might be able to recover from a big crash on the lower levels, expect to see wheels fly off and engines blow up if you lose it in Pro Am or above. Oddly, though, terminal damage doesn't affect more than the single stage you're racing - rather than blow the whole event, you can simply pop back in time and replay the stage at your leisure until you finally manage to make it over the line with all four wheels.

So we've covered the great tracks, the convincing vehicles and that mind-blowing sense of speed but one thing we haven't really touched upon is the overall look of DiRT. On the whole, the word 'beautiful' is probably the best blanket term we can apply and when you're the only car on the track, everything belts along at a suitably impressive rate. Once you start to add other cars into the equation, though, Codemasters' Neon engine starts to feel the strain a little and the game becomes prone to chugging, especially in the early stages of more complex courses where huge settings and entire grids are having to be rendered. It's never game-breaking, but it does tarnish DiRT's otherwise gleaming polish a little, especially after seeing how sacrificing just a little detail enabled Forza 2 to maintain fluidity. This aside, DiRT is probably among the most visually capable racing games we've seen to date, particularly when you opt for the in-car view (or cut to it during a replay) and see every stunning detail from the driver's point of view, even down to the co-driver reeling off the info on his notepad as you shake him to within an inch of his life with your reckless driving.