The reviews are in... TOCA sucks donkey\'s nuts.

I totally respect everything that this guy says. He is an extremely respected member over at granturismo.com. He just bought the final UK version, which was released on the 20th. AUS is released on the 23rd.

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Right, first thing you get after all the copywrite crap is the intro, and boy was I ever stunned. Words cannot even express how awful this intro is. Anyway once it was over and I had wipe the tears of laughter away from my face I got to the main menu. Straight away I noticed the bodge job widescreen code from the demo was still in there, but this time it looks like there\'s even more cut off the top and bottom. Very sloppy.

As not to have to endure another badly acted and cheesey cutscene I went straight to the Freetime room. In here you can choose Multiplayer, Free Race, Time Trial and watch movies of upcoming Codemasters games (along with some promo video on MG Racing). I decided I wanted a blast around a track on my own so I selected Time Trial. Only around half of the tracks are open to begin with, and I noticed the tracks were tied in with the series they belong to. Then I scrolled down and spotted a freestyle section that will allow you to race any of the unlocked tracks with any car. So I decided to take a spin around Bathurst in a Proton Satria GTi (don\'t ask me why I picked that one, I just flicked through the cars and picked one with a nice livery ).

I head out on to the track and things looked ok to begin with. The graphics are no different to the demo, but Bathurst had some nasty popup. Now I\'m not just talking distant popup on the horizon, that I can handle (I mean that\'s been a part of racing games forever), it had some weird flickering trees in the distance that must have been in and out of the draw distance as I rounded a bend. Very distracting. The handling and physics seemed pretty much the same as the demo too, but I was getting airborne at a few points around the circuit. This could be down to inadequate downforce on the car, it\'s probably different driving one of the V8s.

Trial over I go to have a race. I select Donington and choose the MG ZS. This race I actually quite enjoyed, probably due to the fact I know the track fairly well. There were some great closed pack battles going on. I watched the replay afterwards, which had some nasty slowdown, that\'s understandable as nearly all the cars are in view. GT3 still reigns supreme when it comes to watching the replays, though the speed blur in PRD is very nice (you can also notice it at the edge of the screen in game), plus you can actually control the replay (slow mo, fast forward etc.)

Off to the Free Race section again for another race. This time I decided to pick something different. I went for the Americas Series, and selected Mexico and set the conditions to rain. If it wasn\'t for the fact there was a grey sky and lines streaking down the screen you wouldn\'t have even known it was raining because the track didn\'t even look wet. I would have thought you\'d be able to at least see the breaklights reflecting on the track, but to get that effect you have to set it to storm, where it\'s almost like racing at night with full beam lights on. It also seemed the rain didn\'t affect the cars handling all that much, I was still able to throw it in to the corners and back end it was easily recoverable if I started to lose it.

That\'s about as far as I\'ve got so far, I\'m going grab some food and then dive in to the career mode.


__________________
-MonkeyWrench


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I think we should be certainly concerned about CMR3.

[GmanJoe]

NOOO!

:sconf:

All this clown talks about is the graphics. Boo hoo! It\'s not as pretty as GT3 :rolleyes:  . What about the freaking gameplay?!

The only slight mention he makes of it makes it seem like the actual racing is far more intense and hard fought than in GT3. As much as I like GT3, the AI is dumb as f*ck. So the racing is never as intense as it should be, in fact the only way to have an intense racing experience in GT3 is to select a car far inferior to that of your opponents, or to play in the F1 cup. Hopefully this game will deliver on what it promises, which is great racing action in the same vein as J & L.

I agree about the pop-up issue but the racing makes up for it imho. i played it a little bit more last night
and i like it. i still have a little bit of mixed feelings about it, you know, with those dev shots n stuff.
but i only paid £35 for it. once i finish it, i\'ll get £25 back off it, so it really hasn\'t cost me that much.
Also, the game looks to be a rather long affair. there are 38 tracks to race and 41 cars to pick up.
Also there are bonus codes n stuff that you can enter so there may be some wierd options available soon.
The 2 Plr mode suffers from a lower framerate (about 30) but i enjoyed smashing up my mates car.
We just went at it untill the wheels fell off. just for damage testing purposes of course :0).
There is also some swearing in the cut scenes (esp if you ram someone off the road, they take it out of you)
and i witnessed some rather nasty rivalry out on the racetrack between myself and that mardy sod that
i just mentioned. it\'s definatley not blockbuster acting or anything but it serves its purpose. so if your just curious
to how the game plays and looks, i\'d say go rent it then spend an evening with it.
Another thing, i witnessed slowdown about twice in the hour and a half i played it last night. so things are looking
better in the Framerate department. anyway, i\'ll stop waffling, but the bottom line is that i like it.

Also, i just remebered...
The sounds of the cars is absolultey fantastic. they have been sampled on rolling roads so you can
hear the car accelerating under load and when you release the throttle it sounds proper.
Believe me, the cars in this game sound brilliant. definate must play with analogue sticks.

codemasters should be slapped silly for this. This really disappoints me and have now lost a lot of respect for them.

Let the age of the lazy developers begin;)

Hmm, guess we\'ve been spoiled by GT3 :shy:

Im going to wait and see with Toca. Ive talked to a few people and they love it, some hate it.

Btw, I read in PSM2 that CMR3 has some slowdown issues which is TOTALLY unacceptable... Especially when games like World Rally Championship or GT3 run at 60fps..
Blah.

Yep, as i said before Codemasters have got a vision but they just can\'t quite translate it into a really good end product.
Maybee they should go about getting some better Coders and then we may see an improvement to thier software.

Damn, imho Codemasters cant code squit. Compared to WRC and GT3, Toca RD doesn\'t even compare on a graphical level.
man, i told you guys those screens were fake.. Codemasters are the biggest arseholes in my book at the moment.
They need a big shakeup.

Toca in the UK gets released tomorrow

[Kurt Angle]

I got it for £24.99 and the graphics are very dissapointing. At least the gameplay is reasonable.

where did you get it for £24.99 ?

was it from pcworld because i know they have a sale on which every game on any console  costs £24.99

Wait a min!  9 out of 10!!  :eek: This game must be good with that kind of score.  When it comes to the Xbox, I\'ll pick it up.  

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/front_index.php

What i would say to those who are remotley thinking about picking this game up,
atleast go out and rent it. The graphics dont get in the way of the racing. it plays really well.

[Kurt Angle]

Originally posted by MAKAVELIUK
where did you get it for £24.99 ?

was it from pcworld because i know they have a sale on which every game on any console  costs £24.99

Yep, pcworld is where I got it, I think they have sold out in my local branch now though!