PGR 4 is bizzare's racing game ride the most exotic cars and bikes on 106 tracks across 10 different locations
A little background on the game first..
I've been playing racing games for a long time now, and I have followed the PGR series since the start on the Dreamcast where it was called MSR I only missed the first PGR on xbox, and it has evolved quite a bite since that time across platfroms and generations It all started with London, Tokyo and San Francisco and though it only took place in 3 locations it had the impressive total of 262 tracks the biggest number I've seen in any game.
It also introduced something new to racing games that was the kudos system, you could no longer race only, you had to do it well and in style though some people might not like it I think it added quite some depth and variety to the game play this kudos would allow you to unlock some cars as well as progress trought the game the next PGR series were improvements on this formula in almost everyway.
Game play and content
Now PGR 4 doesn't look like just and improvement on graphics and the formula it really is quite a few steps ahead PGR 3.
The first thing anyone will notice ofcourse is the inclusion of bikes, it adds alot of depth and variety to the game though there are some key bikes missing in the game like R1 and ZX10 and CBR 1000, wich i really miss (specially R1 wich is my own ride), some motorcycles are also rpm limited I guess to have some kind of balance between them and the cars from their class for an example the R6 wich should go up to 18.000 rpm only reaches 13,500 rpm.
The cars handle pretty much as you would expect from a PGR game wich is somewhere between arcade and simulation you wont see anything near forza 2's fidelity but its no burnout either its somewhere in between, I'm quite happy myself with the cars they have included I can find most of my personal favourites there and i think most people will find theirs though its missing some very popular ones like skyline gtr 34 or bikes like i mentioned above, you can still find maclaren F1, Ferrari enzo, GSXR 1000, F4 senna etc.
The tracks
The game will take place across 10 different locations with a total of 106 tracks they all look very different from eachother all very faithful to real life, theres a lot of variety to chose from and it will take a long time to get tired of them, to add some depth to it theres also the dynamic weather effects you can start a championship in a sunny day and it starts changing in real time to cloudy then it starts raining it looks really nice and adds depth and realism to gameplay.
The sound and graphics
I'll start by the soundtrack I really liked the intro music the shadow from The Prodigy, its the one you will listen in the menus all the time and it always sounds good the rest of the soundtrackis very varied though i dont like all of it its purely a matter of taste if the reader is anything like me wont be bothered by it at all and when one gets tired of it can simply use a custom soundtrack like in any other xbox 360 game, there's also an option to remove some musics from the playlist or you can change them in real time during game by using the D-pad.
The cars sound nice and realistic so do the bikes but by no means the best I ever heard there are some very wellcome sound options in this game that help enhace your surround experience not only you have control over music volume you have also control on LFE (low frequency effect) volume among others you can configure the dynamic range for home theater, HIFI or TV, Music Mode: stereo, Quad or surround, and your speaker setup you can actually adjust the angle of your speakers in relation to the listening position and the room size to small, medium, large or auditorium.
On the visual side of things the game is the best looking racing game I have played on this gen, even though some games might surpass some particular aspects this one simply wins overall the cities all look amazing with the exception of one that has got some majure texture loading problems, the best way to see this game's graphics is without the latest update that removed dynamic shadows (Bizzare says they are working on that problem so expect to see them in the next update), so I will talk about the graphics without that update as I play them now.
If you played PGR3 are probably wondering how it compares so thats where I'll start, PGR4 is quite a noticeble update like its predecessor it recreates faithfuly the real life cities in the game but this one does so with alot more detail the textures used are a lot better then in pgr3, it all looks more organic and life like including the car's, the only thing that PGR4 seems to be missing is HDR lighting buy most probably wont even notice the lighting is so well done that it doesn't matter the car shadows look really nice and are dynamic in contrast with the track shadows wich aren't don't look as good but still do their job well almost every single building looks fantastic the draw distances are very impressive and though you only are racing in one track it seems to be rendering the entire city in 3D unlike most games, almost every reflective surface reflects every object and building the car reflections are also some of the most impressive on this generation the car/bike models are very well done with high enough polygon countsand beautiful textures, the weather effects look amazing as it starts raining you'll see the road reflection the buildings and cars the heavy rain on the cars all that rendered at a 1280x720p resolution with 2xAA significantly higher than PGR3 at 1024x600p 2xAA, and the same as Forza 2.
So what does that mean the game is perfect? Nowhere near perfect like all games it has its flaws and sacrifices are made theres some kind of a rushed feeling on the game the developers didn't give it as much "love" as they could have its only been a little more than and year and a half between pgr3 and 4, and that reflects on some parts that feel rushed shangai is the only city that looks bad on this game thanks to a huge ammount of texture problems, dont get me wrong textures on shangai would look nice but they never seem to load on time so instead of the traditional pop up you wont have any pop up unless u stop the car and wait for it, in my opinion if they were gonna make shangai like this they could have used the time to polish other tracks or put some more bikes/cars in the game.
With all this said PGR 4 is one of the best racing games available and its definetly the best looking one.
Game play 9/10
Sound 9/10
Graphics 9/10
Replayability 9/10
Overall 9/10