PGR Project Gothan Racing 3

The Line-Up
PGR3 gives you an embarrassment of choices when it comes to the cars you can race-choose from the best of Ford, Ferrari, Mercedes, McLaren, TVR, and many, many more. Notable for their absence are BMW and Porsche, but that ceases to matter when you see what’s on the platter. Car models are incredibly detailed, and are nearly indistinguishable from their real-life counterparts. You plonk them in the varied garages that you can create, and can walk around gawking at them at leisure. On the track, they sound really good, but perhaps more visceral engine roars would have felt better.

Hit The Road
Undoubtedly the highlight of the game, the tracks feature real-life streets from cities such as Las Vegas, New York, Tokyo and London-even the Nürburgring F1 track in Germany. While you will be racing in a closed section, admiring the rest of the city is a pastime you’ll end up being quite tempted to indulge in. The streets of Las Vegas, for example, are a tremendous joy to behold, and more often than not, we ended up stopping in the middle of races to take a look around and admiring the most famous hotels-Caesar’s Palace, the Bellagio, and what have you.

The races are all about glamour-tracks are lined with eager spectators photographing your every move. One rather interesting element did come up here-when you crash into the side of a track, the spectators jump back in horror: nothing great, mind you, but the attention to detail makes one smile.

Just Me And My Car
What we love about this game is its ability to satisfy both the NFS-style arcade nuts and simulation fanatics. Car control is quite a challenge, but once you’ve had enough practice, you can use them exactly the way you want. Perform stunts like brake slides, drifts, 360-degree turns and other wild moves to earn Kudos, which will help you unlock some of the concept cars you can drive. This isn’t as easy as it sounds, though-if you so much as tap the track walls, all your effort falls to nought, and there’s nothing more frustrating than executing a perfect 1-second (that’s longer than you’d think) drift, a breakneck brake slide, topping it with a screeching 360 and then hitting the wall with all the grace of a boiled egg.

Activity Time
Through the game, you’ll be participating in different racing modes-nothing ground-breaking here-just your standard old street races, beat-the-clocks, and a re-jig of the latter called Time vs Kudos, where the clocks stop briefly to let you complete the race depending on the Kudos you earn. The biggest challenges, though, are the Style Challenges, where you have to earn a set number of Kudos before time runs out. Depending on the type of racing you prefer, this can be one of the most fun or the most annoying parts of the game.

Other People
The sad thing about PGR3 is you’re going to have to supply your own entertainment. Oppo-nents have a bland, boring and “propah” driving style that reminds one of old aunties. They lack any sort of aggression and always follow the optimal path in a race, and you’ll rarely hear a skid off their tyres. This is, when you think about it, quite stupid: if you’re expected to earn Kudos by generally insane driving, isn’t it logical that your opponents should be trying to do so too?