DiRT | "DESTROY ALL FANBOYS!"

Awesome. I haven’t even played DiRT Rally yet but I already know it’s going to make a LOT of rally fans very happy. No crazy Gymkhana mode, no “celebrity” drivers, ALL rally all the time and with more realistic controls and car damage? Sign me up, stat! I checked out the Steam page for the game just now and the overwhelming positive response to the game even in its early access state is so positive that it seems Codemasters has gone and made people who are completely new to rally games appreciate the intensity and high difficulty curve (pun intended) not seen in years from the series.

Of course, Codemasters surprised plenty of folks by announcing the game was out now (again, as a work in progress). So I’m betting they’re using all that early feedback to make it a lot better before (hopefully) announcing some console versions. As long as the final version is pure rally and isn’t packing any X-Games style nonsense, I’m in for the long haul.

I think someone at Codemasters is psychic. Last week, I broke out both Colin McRae Rally and Colin McRae Rally 2.0 just to dive in for a bit and see if they still held up today and yes indeed, they do. While the series went through some big changes as the series moved to new platforms, there was always a solid sense of fun and challenge that made each installment thrilling to blaze through. When the series changed its name to DiRT and its direction to a “cooler” racer in order to rope in younger fans of the X Games or other extreme sports, things definitely slid a bit sideways. The last few installments are all great looking games, but to me, there’s something missing… a certain spirit, if you will. Granted, Colin McRae is no longer with us, so that’s probably the missing element those later games haven’t been able to capture. Seeing that intro video above and playing the game for a little while made me hope Codemasters will go back to the drawing board and deliver a rally game that’s as fun and wickedly addictive as the first few in the series. Strip it down, but make it rich with detail, lose the big social focus (or make it completely optional) and maybe even bring back the goofy bonuses from the older titles just because it’s great to see a surprise ride or three after a ton of hard work.