Game Review: DiRT 4

No beating around the bush (pun intended), DiRT 4 brings back, well, more dirt. It is indeed more grounded (pun again intended) in the original concept of rallying, but throws in some fun peripheral elements along the way.

The tutorial for this game is unique in the freedom it affords: select a technique you wish to practice, and rather than set goals which must be met before moving onto the next lesson, the game lets you progress at your own rate. Or, if you wish, just hang out in the practice arena and do burnouts and jumps.

‘DiRT 4’ is endorsed with an FIA World Rallycross Championship moniker, so we’d better have some ‘Rallycross’ then. These events are short circuit, mixed surface tracks which include the so-called “joker” lap concept. The concept – labelled by some in the real-world championship as unfair, artificial and contrived just to entertain TV audiences – requires every driver, for one lap of each race (or as dictated by the stewards as a penalty), to traverse the extra length of the “joker” portion of the track. In ‘DiRT 4’, it adds a level of strategy which is fun to play out, particularly in multiplayer races with friends.

‘Landrush’ events with open-wheel buggies, or stadium trucks leaping from one muddy jump to the next, are other formats which provide a great way to share some laughs with friends online.

So, ‘DiRT 4’ is actually several games in a single package. One is the fun one-off single player and multiplayer times you can have with ‘Rallycross’ and ‘Landrush’ events, and the second is the more serious and long-term commitment to a rally career in either a modern day setting or more historical (and scary) way.

You can play rally modes with one off – even randomly generated – stages if you really want to, but that seems a little pointless. Better to go all in on a career in rally driving, including building your own team, getting sponsorship, designing a car livery and then fine-tuning the all-important timing of your co-driver’s stage note delivery.

The cars and the surrounding countryside look fantastic, albeit a bit light on for dust effects if you happen to be playing from a third-person chase camera perspective. Shadows creep through the trees, and the surrounding dirt banks, foliage and shrubbery feels natural and never repetitive.

Unexpected townships are welcome diversions from the countryside flying by, and the occasional broken-down competitor parked beside the road adds a further sense of realism to the stages.

Make a slightly wrong move and you will find just how debilitating a seemingly fragile wire fence can be to a speeding rally car. And whilst on the subject of going off road, ‘DiRT 4’ is certainly more forgiving than most rally games. For example, you can bash the nearby bush for a significant time before returning to the road.

This is important, because there are no reload checkpoints, or rewind options on these rally stages, and some can be lengthy. Instead, the game offers a limited amount of ‘restarts’ allowing the stage to be redone. Or, if you find yourself stuck in a tree, you can recover your vehicle for an appropriate time-penalty.

Between stages, the game offers a rather unique repair feature which takes a punt at how long each repair may take. However nothing is guaranteed and sometimes repairs take shorter, or more often than not, longer than originally suggested. This adds a level of strategy to the between-stages moments.

Strangely there is no tyre selection process in ‘DiRT 4’, probably the first time we haven’t seen this option. But there are many other ways to tweak your car before each race or stage, so plonking on the obvious tyre selection is not really going to be missed.

Currently ‘DiRT 4’ only features rally stages from four countries; Australia (yay!), Sweden, Wales, Spain and Michigan in the USA. Each offers a mix of surfaces, and weather, and - as mentioned earlier - this game provides a facility to generate an infinite array of randomly produced stages with the adjustment of a few sliders and a press of a button.

There are over 50 vehicles in the game, from the fun Crosskarts, out of control Pro Buggies through to more familiar modern and historical rally vehicles. The physics of each car feel faithful; a bit floaty and somewhat rolling for example with a Ford Fiesta contrasted with the more sure-footed AWD paws of a Subaru WRX STI NR4.

Apart from hooking up with friends online, ‘DiRT 4’ offers daily, weekly and even month long challenges where selected events can be taken on with those from around the world.

‘DiRT 4’ is a refined, polished and focussed release which doesn’t try to artificially impress with large numbers of bullet points, oversized stable of cars or modes. Instead, we get the tight package of events and locations fans demand. The ‘Rallycross’ and ‘Landrush’ events are fun, the rallying sophisticated, at times frustrating, and certainly challenging. Exactly what we were looking for.