DiRT 3 – Review
Platform | Release Date
PC | May 24, 2011
PS3 | May 24, 2011
X360 | May 24, 2011
Developed by Codemasters
Published by Codemasters
The Pitch:
DiRT 3 boasts more cars, more locations, more routes and more events than any other game in the series, including over 50 rally cars representing the very best from five decades of the sport. With more than double the track content of 2009’s hit, DiRT 3 will see players start at the top as a professional driver, with a top-flight career in competitive off-road racing complimented by the opportunity to express themselves in Gymkhana-style showpiece driving events.
Within minutes of firing up DiRT 3 I’m met with chirpy cool kids spouting awesomes and dudes at me. The Colin McRae name abandoned long ago in favour of Monster energy drinks and skate shoe sponsorship. You could have considered me surprised when I quickly discovered that this is the most heavily rally orientated release that this well-reviewed series has ever produced.
Flashy menus drag you through an initial registration process, signing you up to a fictional four season contract within the world of extreme motorsport. This primary career mode, titled DiRT Tour, sees you undertake a litany of events across several disciplines. Far fewer than you might have been expecting however – trucks and high-speed mountain climbs are long gone. Straight rally events do return though, alongside Land Rush, Rally Cross and Head-to-Head events. While the latter offers one-on-one competition the other two are more standard race events. Between them all you’ll still get to play in buggies and pickups alongside standard cars from the 80s onwards. In general though, this is a game with a definite focus rather than attempting to be a jack of all trades.
This works well – the handling models and tracks are keenly designed to best fit the small group of differing vehicle types. Spread across Europe, Africa and the Americas each course bears the hallmarks of the veteran developers working on them. Lacking any filler content the tracks are fair, an enjoyable mix of tight bends and thrilling jumps. With reasonably good lighting and decent weather effects each location is given a veneer befitting the host nation. Unfortunately, the very problem that has hampered my enjoyment of previous DiRT games, and Codemasters’ GRID also, raises its ugly head once more.
When content is spread between multiple disciplines, and multiple disciplines that require there own dedicated tracks, it becomes intensely difficult for developers to deliver a proper volume of courses. By about half way through the career I already felt as if I was retreading old ground. In some cases this was literal, in others simply revisiting the same locale brought a feeling of familiary, breeding contempt in turn. Authentic rally racing isn’t about gunning through well-known cities (even if Monaco makes an appearance) nor iconic race courses but when you see the same set of evergreens for the sixth time its difficult to retain your enthusiasm to continue.
The big new event for this third iteration might help to disrupt that. Gymkhana could be described as rally cars in skate parks – a mix of jumps, drift banks, spin zones and donut targets that you’re required to combo together using skillful manipulation of your vehicle. Initially it’s pretty tough – far harder than the unchallenging AI of the race and time trial events – but once you’ve got the hang of using your hand-break it becomes shockingly enjoyable. As the career events unlocked I found myself seeking out Gymkhana – at every juncture it felt like a meaningful, fun change of scenery.
The multiplayer party modes that spawn out of it, where you and a friend challenge each other at knocking down alien cardboard cut-outs, are far less valuable and won’t be at the core of your multiplayer activity. The robust set of more traditional online modes is open only to those who purchase the game new or fork out a premium. Stable network code will, no doubt, lead to you being trounced by the racing die-hards that populate Xbox Live and PSN – something that the developers would struggle to do anything about, but is an ever-present risk in the search to foster a lively, active community. I imagine that the servers will remain busy, this is a popular product after all, but within a month of release it won’t be a place for amateurs.
Ultimately though it was the repitition that killed my enjoyment of DiRT 3. The game doesn’t offer the variety of the first, nor the stark change of direction offered by the second, and ends up feeling like a satisfactory but bland follow-up. Technically, and in terms of design and presentation, there’s very little that you can fault Codemasters for but in a competitive marketplace the game doesn’t do enough to set itself apart. It’s neither bigger, nor badder than any of its closest competitors.
Related Posts:
I’d rate Dirt 3 way above 6, well, around 8. Best in the series and there really isn’t any rally games to compete with.
You need to keep in mind that Martin didn’t pick this number per say. It’s a number that is derived from the average play session. He’ll rate his session on how much fun he had and then the graph automatically makes up a number based on all those! So don’t base this number like you would a “normal” review, take it as how much fun he had playing the game. While the game could have AWESOME fundamentals, that doesn’t necessarily mean it was fun.
What I’m trying to say is: We want to know how much FUN a game is; That is what they are all about!
It’s this that means our scores may deviate quite a bit from the industry mean. We won’t be doing it for controversy, these are true representations of how entertained we were by an entertainment product.
I predict many a comment like this in the future…unfortunately.
(Not a dig at the original comment, or any who do this: I am simply making a comment on the inevitable side effect of how different the F.P.S. system is.)
Never been a big fan of serious racing games, but if any developer could ever manage to sway me it would probably be Codemasters. I was always a fan of Colin McRae Rally on the PSX, sitting in my friend’s bedroom after school trading off the controller between races, so it’s good to hear the series hasn’t lost its appeal. I had toyed with DiRT 2 a little on the PC a while back, but that was only to see what DX11 features it actually used when I got my 470. I did enjoy the little I played, however.
Rally Cross was the last rally racing game I played, I plan on checking out DiRT3 soon