A painstakingly realistic driving experience that will leave you on the edge of your seat...
No story is present here, you basically need to collect every single last car in the game, which because of the vast amount of cars, will have you playing this for months on end. You also need to participate in races and work yourself up the racing food chain by beating everyone else and passing liscence tests to open up new races and tracks.
As far as graphics go on the PS1, this game is truly a sight to behold. Cars are detailed finely and never seem to be boring and bland, even for a PS1 title. You may also notice that whenever you find yourself grinding along a guardrail, your car doesn't take any damage and looks like nothing ever happened. The tracks are also detailed and beautiful. The road seems to blur when you go at high speeds, adding to the realism and rush of the concept. The crowds are 2D, but you never seem to notice since your focused on not crashing into your opponents or drifting off into a wall.
The soundtrack for this game is a little on the narrow side. There are a few songs in the game, but none of them are diverse from the rest to be able to stop you from turning on the radio. The car engine noises are also a little narrow in the way they sound. There are 2 engine noises, you and whoever else is on the track. The skid effects in the game are a nice touch, though. They really give you a feeling that you screwed up big time and motivate you to get things right.
The car controls in this game are so realistic that they become painstakingly hard and frustrating. You need to get just the right speed and just the right angle, or your going to meet face-to-face with the nearest wall. Thankfully, you can aviod a crash by tuning your car to adjust it to each track, but unless if your a major gearhead, you'll have absolutely no idea what you're doing to your car and you'll end up wrecking the whole entire car so that it drives at granny speeds. The liscence tests are the most frustrating part of the game. The missions sound simple enough, whether they require you to make a few turns correctly or stop and go, but trust me, you'll be trying this so many times, that you'll be losing count at 100.
Overall, aside from the difficulty, this is a solid racing game that anyone who enjoys tuning will love, but for the rest of you who want to play an old game that wasn't designed for people who love wrenches and such, go play something else.