Racing games: Why I love them again!

Vrooooom! The roar of the engine and the feel of speed as you whip around corners, that's what a racing game gives you and the ability to race cars that are worth millions of dollars.

Over the last year, I've played alot of racing games and haven't been too favorable towards alot of such as Atari's Race pro or Need for Speed:Underground. Something changed recently when I sat down with the latest batch such as Codemaster's Dirt 2 or Turn10's Forza Motorsport 3.

I'm not a car guy not in the very least, I'm sure cars run on magic and are appreciated by people who understand cars like a science. Car games have given me an insight into this wonderful world of cars and high performance machines and it makes me want to learn more and in specifically Forza 3 really opened my eyes.

Forza Motorsport 3 is one of the games that really gets you going because it's so accessible if you want a casual experience or can be a true driving sim if you want to turn on the professional settings. The experience was one that really brought back that feel of 16 bit racing of Top Gear to me and that's what made so much fun that is that it could be casual for players like me. The first time I raced out was with a tricked out Yaris...thats right the soccer mom of the speedway car. Cruising down the motorways with 400+ cars is a tremendously cool especially when you can customize them to resemble some of your favorite movie vehicles...so take a guess which one I love the most


That one option made Forza 3, a truly unforgettable experience for me but you could also go back and play as other movie vehicles like Transformers but I didnt see if there were ones like KITT or any of the cars from Fast and the furious.



Another game that captured my attention but for entirely different reasons was Codemaster's Dirt 2. Dirt is a rally racing game from the late racing legend Colin McRae and its one of the surprised that I've had recently with the racing game genre. I would call Dirt 2, the Tony hawk of the racing games because it's very much like the X games in style and attitude. Rally racing is like off roading and all the fun that comes with taking a truck or car and trashing it more or less. Dirt 2 really captures a different aspect of fun of racing and it all about the presentation and attitude and Dirt 2 absolutely nails it.

Dirt 2 has an awesome sound track and that really gets you pumped up and excited about tearing down tracks in Baja, California or over in Europe. I was SOOO surprised to hear some Rise Against and that just got me pysched up to put the pedal to the metal. The physics of the game also really surprised by how much I could fish tail if I wasn't driving carefully but that kind of added to it for in a sense for me. Controlled adrenaline is what I would call the experience and thats what made so cool. Dirt 2 was very much like an experience to be taken in with the crazy career mode races and call outs from famous drivers like Dave Mirra and just watching your own playbacks set to some wicked tunes.

I fell in love with the racing games again with these titles and I think it's worth your time to give them both a rent at least and shift into high gear and prepare to unleash your inner speed demon!