TOCA Race Driver 2: The Ultimate Racing Simulator Preview

“What was that? What exactly was that?”

The crew chief on TOCA Race Driver 2: The Ultimate Racing Simulator is less than impressed with your efforts behind the wheel of a finely crafted racing machine – the one you just put into a wall trying to sneak past the competition on a corner that was a little too much for the speed you were carrying into it. His rich-English accent admonishes and then encourages.

But there is hope for you; all you have to do is prove your worth through a series of grueling races against some very tough competition. If you can do that, you may – one day – win his praise.

So, it is off to the courses, traversing the globe on a path to racing greatness. Think you can handle it?

TOCA Race Driver 2: The Ultimate Racing Simulator is the October release for Codemasters on the PlayStation2 that continues the hot-selling series. Real damage, to the point of being unable to continue to race, powers the visuals and challenge of this game, but it also has a terrific options package following in pursuit.

The game sports 33 championships and 35 of some of the most powerful street machines ever converted to racing. Cars include three types of Jaguars (XJ220, XKR and E-Type), classic American cars like the Mustang Cobra R and Ford GT, the Subaru Impreza WRX, Opel Astra V8 Coupe, Aston Martin V12 Vanquish, the ABT-Audi TT-R and AMG-Mercedes CLK – to name but a few. There are 15 different motor sports in this package and 52 tracks with 21 cars on the track simultaneously.

The story follows the tried-and-true line of finishing at the top to advance, but finishing well enough in the money to continue to feed that nasty auto-upgrade habit. The game also incorporates a new engine that yields 60 frames per second. Multiplayer mode will allow up to eight players to compete.

All that is well and good, of course, but how does the game handle? We’ll get to that in a moment.

The preview build that GameZone received was very tight and the controls follow the standard variety of accelerate/brake and steer routines that many games have.

First off, there are four modes of play – free race, time trial, multiplayer, and network. There is also the standard array of records and replay that you can view.

Control options allow players to adjust the gearbox from automatic to manual, and there are two handling modes – simulation and pro simulation (the latter comes with a warning about its difficulty).

Forget the default opening race, there are others you can jump into and compete in. Take the ’68 Mustang Challenge for example. You are given a 1968 Ford Mustang and turned loose on the track at Leguna Seca. Twenty cars on the track, with wide gravel-spinout areas flanking the tracks and hot little turns that will have the pack slowing down unexpectedly are just part of the challenge.

Another part is not getting caught up in the sterling graphical elements.

There are four views: behind the car and slightly above (3^rd-person perspective), through the windshield from the driver’s side, through the windshield from the rear-view mirror and off the front-bumper – no true cockpit vantage point.

While some of the damage is unrealistic (the cars tend to start to go into an inverted V shape way too fast from a front-on collision), the game does sport damage that affects performance. The cars all handle differently, and what you may get away with on one vehicle may well prove your undoing with another. But take that Mustang race for example. The default ‘Stang you drive is black and red. The hood of the car is a glossy black, and should you pop the game into the windshield viewpoint, you will be treated to dazzling environmental reflections off the hood – clouds and overpasses that look very realistic.

As mentioned, each car handles a little differently. In some cases, the nuances are almost imperceptible, until you hit a corner faster than you should be going, or try to recover from a spin in the gravel. This game is about surviving without a lot of damage, knowing the tracks, and coaxing your machine through the twists and turns. It appears that most of the cars, initially, are equal in power, so skill has to take over to win the races.

The AI is not overly bright, but – if anything – errors in that direction on the side of caution. You can read what it will do and with a little ‘devil-may-care’ attitude you can pass them, rub them and cut them off to your heart’s content.

TOCA Race Driver 2 is about finesse, and winning, of course.

This is a terrific racing experience that players should check out. While the game does have a few minor areas that are not quite realistic, the overall experience is intense, and challenging.