I understand that there's been some sort of problem with the US release of the XBox version so I don't know how many others can chime in immediately, but there've been no such problems in the UK so I thought I'd throw a few initial impressions out.

The first thing that strikes you is the sheer size of the bloody thing.  Somehow staring at a list of the cars and tracks doesn't do enough to convey just how many championships there are to scroll through in the menu screens.  Most of them are locked to start with, made available by progress through the World Tour and Pro Career modes - those with a TRD 2 save floating around somewhere will receive exactly one extra unlocked series by way of reward.

I've only had a couple of hours with it so far, but here are a few early thoughts:

- On first viewing the graphics don't seem massively improved over those in the previous edition.  They're still perfectly serviceable and the engine does a fine job of shifting a full grid of cars, but you wouldn't necessarily show ToCA to someone you were desperate to convince of the power of your console.  Sound is largely unchanged too, though I'm not sure there's too much more you can do when all you're working with is engines, tyres and the odd collision.

- The first few series in the World Tour mode (like the career in ToCA RD 2) are almost offensively easy.  The Baja offroad buggies in tier 4 are almost offensively hard.  It seems that the occasional difficulty spikes of the last game have returned, though as always how difficult a category is depends entirely on where your driving talents lie.  You do get a choice of series in every tier of racing up to the final few races, so you can pick and choose according to your strengths and avoid making the sort of selection boo-boo I've clearly made.

- The cars seem to have a bit more weight to them than previously.  This is particularly noticeable in the DTM series, where it was previously possible to throw the cars around almost at will.  Now, much more consideration must be given to where you're going and how you plan to get there, lest you find yourself departing the Tarmac at speed.  If you do that, you'll find that...

- ...the warning flag system is broken.  Hideously, desperately screwed up.  The idea is that you receive the black and white diagonalled flag for unsportsmanlike behaviour if you rough someone up on track or take a shortcut that benefits either your track position or lap time.  The roughing someone up flags work fine, even if they're quite harsh on occasion.  The leaving the track ones, however, don't.  I've been penalised for running wide and spinning through 90 degrees, running wide and then hitting the brakes to make certain I can't be seen to gain from it (then again, you're running wide, there's nothing to gain there), missing my braking point for a chicane, going off and then purposely braking to a stop, putting an outside wheel on the kerbing...

The best one of all so far was a test I ran.  Run wide into a chicane, kick the car back towards the ideal line, apply the handbrake and spin backwards just inside the inner kerbing of the second part of the chicane, lump the car over the kerbs backwards, stop, turn round, carry on.  It cost me, at a rough estimate, 7 or 8 seconds.  I was given a black and white flag.

That's my only concern so far, but it's a very big concern.  If anyone has any thoughts on the game or general questions about it stick them here.

Cheers,
Adam

Ted,

I'm hoping the careless driving flags can be turned off but all other flags left on - that would probably suffice at the moment since there are some series where your qualifying (ah, yes - you can qualify in Career mode now too) only lasts 3 laps and with this flag system it's quite conceivable that you could have all 3 times taken away from you.

I don't know about the IndyCars at the minute - I've still got ICS 2005 and I'm hoping the physics are carried over.  I've seen the cars in action in the intro sequence but I've got no idea about the actual gameplay yet since they're locked.  I'm hoping to arrive at them in the next day or two, though, so I'll keep you updated on that.

Cheers,
Adam

Zep, this is the first game I've played in a good couple of years that's had me throwing my pad to the ground in frustration.  The flag penalties are really getting to me - at Donington in the British GT series last night I put my outside wheels onto the kerb and absolutely no further coming out of the Old Hairpin and got penalised for it.  There should not be a penalty for maximising the available track, that's absolutely ludicrous.

I agree completely with the assessment of the main game modes - World Tour seems more like a chance to see what the game has to offer in terms of cars and tracks.  A display of wares, if you like.  Pro Career is more like the sort of thing you'll keep coming back to.

Speaking of Pro Career - Ted, I played through some of the Oval career to get to the IndyCars for you, and there's no way I'm advising you to buy the game just on the strength of those.  Played on normal settings there's not a whole lot of difference between the ICS and the American 1000 cars (I think that's what they were called, the blatant ICS copy) in TRD 2.  Put the Pro Simulation settings on and it's better, with more of the feeling of weight I referred to in my first post, but still not massively removed from the American 1000.  Certainly there isn't as much depth in the handling model and the transitional stages of the car during a long run, and in the name of accessibility some of the details are left out - for example, 6th is a racing gear, not an overtaking one.  At least in this mode, there are only 20 cars with some big players missing, and only Nashville, Indy, Gateway and Dover to race on.  I have to say that it's still enjoyable.  It just bears absolutely no resemblance to the Codies Indy games you enjoyed so much.

I wouldn't want to dissuade you from buying - in fact, if you got any mileage at all out of TRD 2 then this game is a must have - but don't buy it just for the IndyCars.

Something that I thought was nice is that while there have been a few developments in the physics engine - on XBox, since PS2 and PC owners got Pro Sim last time around - you don't have to use them if you don't want to.  If you're like me and enjoyed TRD 2 but wished the cars had a bit more heft about them, switch the Sim settings on and you're away.  If you're after more of the same, leave them off.  It might be a bit of a stretch to say the game caters for everyone in how it handles but there won't be too many who can't find a nice balance.

I do like this game.  I like it an awful lot - it gives me a competitive race, it feels good to drive and more often than not it gets the fine details right.  I don't love it just yet - there's not a lot in it that annoys me but the few things that do are really, really hacking me off.

Cheers,
Adam

A quick check reveals that depending on which mode you're playing in, the 'careless driving' flags can be disabled.  I'm very much hoping that'll cover my But Look I'm Still On The Bloody Track situation.

I posted at DSP a few seconds ago and the first thing I wrote about was the DTM cars at Spa Francorchamps, Pro Sim handling enabled.  It's absolute, pure driving bliss from start to 20th place finish.  Everything about it just feels right.

I'm beginning to think that all I need is a couple more hours with this game and I'll fall in love with it, but then immediately countering that by reminding myself that the ICS was disappointing and the sprint cars aren't exactly a triumph.  It's such a good game when everything comes together - what I don't know just yet is if it comes together often enough for it to be a great game.

Ted, the sprint cars are just dull.  Two tracks, one a longer dirt oval and one a shorter, narrower one, and just the one skill to learn.  If you can turn into a corner nice and slowly, wait for the slide to begin (it's a very slow, progressive slide so there's not really an awful lot of skill involved in holding it), keep the car just barely drifting through the corner and then drive off, you're done.  It's a problem specific to the oval series in this game - if you're making a game based entirely around sprinters, or ICS, or NASCAR or whatever, then you can create an engaging simulation of the sport.  If you do it as part of a multi-series game, then you start leaving out the details and what you're left with is a few left turns.  I can't abide people saying that where ICS 2005 or WoO Sprintcars is concerned, but in TRD 3 not a single one of the oval series holds your attention for more than a few minutes.

As regards offline AI, from what I've seen so far they seem to race each other as well as you.  In the Formula Palmer Audi cars last night I was able to profit more than once from AI cars racing each other and slowing each other just enough to let me close up and get involved.  Naturally you see a lot more of this if you start mid-grid and have to fight your way through on lap one, but it seems as though they keep racing to the end.

Cheers,
Adam

Those bloody flags...

Run wide and onto the kerbing going through a tight left hander at Hockenheim and you'll get a warning flag.  Take too much kerb on the inside of the turn into the stadium and the same thing will happen.  Run wide and clean off the racetrack, with the entire car in the tarmac run off going through the final two corners, and absolutely nothing happens.

It's actually not a huge issue once you learn which parts of which racetracks are problem areas and start to run within the limitations of the system, but the system is screwed up whichever way you look at it.  Also screwed up, it seems, are Bathurst (some very incorrect cambers in evidence) and Oulton Park, whose layout is exactly as Oulton Park's would be if it was 3 times wider, opened up the radius of every turn dramatically and modelled at least 3 corner entries on the north face of the Eiger.  It's a bit much when you're following a British GT field into Old Hall and every single one of them takes off over the hump on the way in.

However, even despite all that it is a lot of fun.  Reading through the impressions you'll notice I've devoted a lot of time to a small number of complaints, and if the balance seems off that's only because as with Pro Evolution Soccer, it's not that easy to convey in words exactly why ToCA is so entertaining.  It feels right, in general, and where it doesn't feel right I've mentioned it in here and tried to say why.  The only other series I have any complaints about are the off-road ones, where you're apparently driving through treacle in every corner since no matter how hard you throttle on, the revs refuse to increase.  Even those classes are fun, though, because whatever limitations you're subject to don't disadvantage you against the CPU, and as long as you play fair you can really have a race with them.

Believe it or not, I reckon there's more mileage in this thread yet, so I'll probably have some more in a day or two.  As always, questions, comments and brickbats are welcome.

Cheers,
Adam

Ted,

Thought you might like to know that I've had another shot at the IndyCars and I'm getting a bit happier them.  It still doesn't compare to any standalone Indy game you've played recently, and with only 4 tracks to go at I still can't recommend buying TRD 3 for this series alone, but...

There's a bit more meat to the handling model than I'd first realised.  There's no need at all to go playing around with setups, but run what you're given in Pro Sim mode and you'll find you do have understeer, and oversteer, and especially understeer.  That's the qualifier, though - you have to run this series in Pro Sim.  Play it on the standard settings and it's still never more than cars on a flat out bind with the occasional turn.  In Pro Sim you've got to drive them, and while your actions never have as obvious an effect as they do in ICS (especially if you get things wrong - this is ToCA, you can get away with it a few times and the car won't ever do anything nasty to you) you've got to run a proper line and judge your entry speeds - it does require a little thought to get the most out of your lap.

Even knowing that, it's still one of my least favourite series, but there is a bit more to it than I'd originally thought.  The main problem I have is that it's still ToCA, and ToCA on an oval is a fundamentally dull experience because you're always in control.  The car won't ever get loose unless you do something quite silly with the throttle, and if you take that out of the equation there's only one way to put it in the fence.  I'm not suggesting you'd want to put it in the fence, mind, but if there's little danger that you will and the oval AI isn't half as much fun as the road course AI then it may as well be Scalextric slot cars you're racing.

You could quite conceivably write a little review like that on every single category, and the bulk of them would be a bit more glowing than this one.  I singled out the IndyCars because they're of interest to people here, not because I don't rate them highly.  However, since I don't, in the next day or two I'll throw together a post on a class I do like, because some of these posts have an air of gloom around them that the majority of the classes don't deserve.

Cheers,
Adam

Zep, I've just got to the 80's Williams - seemed a peculiar choice of motor to me until I remembered that the FW11B gave Nelson Piquet the 1987 title and is only really second to the 1988 McLaren in terms of dominating a season in that decade - and I'm slowly starting to soften towards them.  To start with I wasn't happy because the season opens at Zandvoort and you spend rather more time in the air than you should, but once you learn to accept that they're a lot of fun.  Haven't had them on Pro Sim yet, since I'm doing World Tour without it and then running the free race and Pro Career with it switched on, but they're very entertaining cars.

If it's screwy AI behaviour you want - on lap 2 of the 80's Williams race at Zandvoort every car ahead of me began to brake for Tarzan, the first turn, about 300 yards before they'd ever need to.  They'd never done it before, they've never done it since.  Also of note in the They Did Wha'?  category is Dan Wheldon running second and gaining on the last lap at Nashville before jumping on the brakes coming out of the final turn, and the entire driving staff of the IRL meeting at Dover, all of whom appear to be driving a different, much slower racetrack.

I've been elsewhere for the last couple of days, hence the lack of a good ToCA post to balance my bad ToCA one.  Oh, Zep - you've been missing absolutely nothing in the console Formula One stakes, believe me.

Good ToCA time, chaps.

The 1987 Williams Honda FW11B is incredible fun.  Big slicks give bags of grip in the high speed corners, while 1000 brake on tap means you've got licence to slide coming out of the slower corners.  Slide you must, too, because here is a car that practically begs you to drive it on the throttle.  It's a racing car, that's what they're designed for, but here is a particularly fine example of a motor that delivers better results if you're willing to gun it hard and early.

Your enjoyment of them in round one of their World Tour series at Zandvoort, however, is limited by how happy you are about what happens at the end of the back straight.  But Peter, how will we get to Neverland?

Think of Christmas, think of snow
Think of sleigh bells, off you go
Like reindeer in the sky
You can fly, you can fly, you can fly!

You've got to judge the jump just right as well, because a) there's a barrier very close in on the outside of the track and b) there's a very fast corner immediately afterwards.  The good news is that assuming you made it down safely, you'll have so much fun going flat in 5th through the next right hander that you'll forget all about your unscheduled flight.  It does end up being fun once you reconcile yourself with the idea that a Formula One car can do that kind of thing without dissolving.

Curiously, the much faster FW18 of 1996 doesn't fly at the same point.  You can account for some of that with the extra downforce of the car, but it still seems peculiar.

Ignore that, though, and the car isn't capable of being anything less than entertaining.  The AI races you properly, gives you room but isn't scared to have a go, and some of the track selections - in fact, all of them, even Bahrain where the lap is interrupted by no fewer than 3 separate high jump contests - are inspired.  When it's done as well as this, TRD 3 is as good a console racer as you'll find.

Ted, you mentioned level playing fields, and here I'm seeking an opinion - is this the game providing a level playing field or is it the AI being atrocious?

The FW18 series takes you to Silverstone for round two, and having grown frustrated with my inability to find any sort of grip on my favourite circuit I decided to not qualify and start the 6 lap race from P20.  What I didn't know, and hadn't realised in round one at Hockenheim since I was preoccupied with not crashing in the early stages, is that in this series there's a world of difference between the grip levels of hot and cold tyres.

As I steamed into Copse with clear track ahead of me - I wasn't 1st already, I'd just left the line with all the fast reactions and controlled acceleration of a doorframe - I was alerted not only to my failure to take the planned route towards the apex and consequent disappearance stage left, but also to the 6 AI cars ahead of me that had done exactly the same thing.  My attention was particularly drawn to the one just ahead of and about 3 feet below my now airborne car.  Shunt, swear, restart.

Take 2 and I made it through the carnage at Copse and got all the way to the Becketts complex - yes, all the way to turn two - before being speared by a car that had gone off through the Maggots right hander and managed to rejoin the track backwards on the exit of the left at Becketts, right in front of me and just far enough away that I had time to register his presence as I thundered into him.  Shunt, swear, restart.

For two hours.

For some reason, there is absolutely no grip with this particular car/track combination.  It's fine everywhere else, just at Silverstone.  Normally in a racing game, if you've got no grip then you're left sat on your rear wondering what happened as the AI cars disappear into the far distance.  Here, I eventually finished 5th in a mandatory pit stop race and would have done much better if I hadn't rallycrossed my way round the second lap.  Along the way I saw a series of spins ranging from the forgiveable (two cars in consecutive corners having the accidents I'd threatened to have a lap earlier) to the frankly bizarre (at least half the field had a moment at Copse at some stage, including one car that I saw drop it on the exit of the pit lane...) to the Takuma Sato - if I'm braking at the 100 metre board and just about getting slowed down in time for Stowe, braking 10 metres later than me and taking 20 mph more into the corner with you will not work, and a trip into the gravel will surely follow.

That was all in the race I finished.  You should have seen the ones I had to restart.  It's the only time I've ever played a ToCA game and felt the other cars were apparently being driven by the cast of Police Academy, but in the middle of it all I was Steve Guttenberg, in a manner of speaking.  Every single one of the AI cars was all over the show at some point, but in amongst them I was appreciably faster in only a couple of places, both of those braking zones and not corners, and I was in the scenery about as often as they were.  For the rest of the series the AI was fine - is this brilliance on the part of the developer or have they in fact royally screwed it up?

It must be screwy, surely?  The thing is, if the AI is screwy then it still gave me two of the most entertaining hours I've spent with any racer - do I forgive it?

Cheers,
Adam