Richard Burns Rally PC DVD-ROM
Published by Mastertronic Added Dimension
Developed by Warthog
Release Date: Out Now
Price: £9.99
Driving games come in two flavours. You have the arcade driving games that anyone can enjoy, because they can throw the cars around the circuits, and there's the realistic driving simulations that annoy and frustrate but ultimately give the most satisfaction as you have to invest a lot of time in learning to drive instead of just getting on with it. For Formula 1 fans the height of realistic driving is Grand Prix Legends and here we have the Rally driving equivalent, Richard Burns Rally.
As you may have gathered from the intro this isn't a game for the impatient. You'll spend hours just learning how not to come off the track at every turn. Using a keyboard it's just impossible (at least for me) to do well and even with a good steering wheel you'll need to put the time and effort in to get comfortable with the game. The game offers a Rally School mode, Quick Rally, Multiplayer, Rally Season and for when you think you've mastered the game a Richard Burns Challenge.
Graphically the game looks very good and the car models in particular are impressive. The game still suffers from the cardboard cut-out trees (like all rally games seem to do) but on the whole the 36 stages look impressive, particularly with the inclusion of dynamic weather. For deaf gamers the experience is the usual one for rally games. The co-driver's pace notes are not subtitled and his directional information is shown via icons. You can enable 3D icons that appear on the road in front of you, which I think works well. The information at the beginning of each lesson, in the Rally School Mode, is shown in text. However any verbal information delivered during a lesson is not shown in text.
Richard Burns Rally is the most realistic rally simulation to date and it's an essential purchase for fans of realistic driving simulations. Be warned though, this is not a rally game for the casual gamer but it's all the more rewarding for the effort it demands.
Overall Game Rating: 4.0/5
Deaf Gamers Classification:
(Click the letter or here for details)
A top notch rally sim but it's for enthusiasts only. A quality steering wheel is essential for the full experience.