Review: DiRT Rally 2.0 Celebrates the Driver’s Will to Try, Try Again

At the very least, the game’s epic trials will make you respect the practitioners of this most insane of sports.

DiRT Rally 2.0
Photo: Codemasters

After you unlock only the second rallying event in DiRT Rally 2.0, the game’s extreme difficulty is dryly confirmed by the British voiceover: “Some might suggest this is where your first real challenge awaits.” For newcomers to the world of developer Codemaster’s rally simulators, the understatement of that quote might sting as much as it inspires laughter. Throughout, you might spend numerous hours struggling to find out how to deal with understeering, oversteering, lack of tire traction, vehicle instability, track degradation, unideal weather, and the sense that, no matter how focused and careful you are, you’re just not fast enough to keep up with your competitors.

But this is no arcade racer, after all. It’s the sequel to what some critics have called the best rally sim ever. In rallying, drivers don’t race head to head on a circular track, but rather take turns zipping along on literal roads—whether gravel, dirt, asphalt, or various combinations thereof—that might cut through forests, towns, mountains, and water. As the lone car on the track, your goal is to make it to the finish line in the shortest amount of time, but one good performance isn’t good enough. A rallying champion, according to this game, must achieve the best composite score across several miles-long tracks within multiple countries.

At the very least, the game’s epic trials will make you respect the practitioners of this most insane of sports. As your vehicle weaves through the beautiful fall-season trees of New England or rocky terrains of Argentina, you can’t help but ponder the bravery of individuals who confront ever-changing street and weather conditions and live to see another day. Your tragic incompetence in DiRT Rally 2.0 allows you to empathize with the hypothetical real-world competitors who nail one death-defying turn after another before misjudging a single kink in the road that sends their vehicles through a fence and rolling down a hill.

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Mercifully, you can at any point in the game open a pause menu and restart a track so that your composite score isn’t ruined by a slight miscalculation on your part on a given track. A purist might say that this fundamentally contradicts the reality that rallying is a death-defying sport where there are no second chances, but a restart is often what the common player needs to maintain the will to keep trying within the framework of an otherwise viciously unforgiving game. For a title without a clear tutorial—and for one that can make Dark Souls seem like a walk in the park—the unrealistic do-over option is a necessary mercy.

Half the battle here is figuring out what car works best for you based on how it operates on a variety of surfaces. Though acclaimed, the first DiRT Rally was criticized for not making car and road types feel distinct—a limitation that’s been solved here. Not only can you almost taste the dirt and gravel kicked up by your vehicle, the difference in traction between rocky terrains and asphalt roadways is unmistakable. Likewise, the superior handling of a car, such as the gorgeous Lancia Fulvia HF, that weighs less than 2,000 pounds cannot be overstated.

For those interested in a more recognizable form of racing, Codemasters has more than doubled the original game’s number of rallycross locations, where five drivers jockey for position around the corners of a racetrack. Although the rallycross events don’t feature the natural surroundings of rallying competitions, they can seem more visceral as you bump and ram into your rivals. Between these races, you might find yourself tinkering countless times with your car selection and setup, as many rallycross cars are built more for power than graceful maneuvering. Stay patient, however, and the subtleties of executing a win—how to anticipate the green-light signal that starts the race, when to steer into an opponent, and what modifications to make to a vehicle—will take shape in your mind, leading to a deeper appreciation of a sport that’s foreign to almost all of us.

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This game was reviewed using a download code provided by Tinsley PR.

Score: 
 Developer: Codemasters  Publisher: Codemasters  Platform: PlayStation 4  Release Date: February 26, 2019  Buy: Game

Jed Pressgrove

Jed Pressgrove's writing has appeared in Game Bias, Film Quarantine, and Unwinnable.

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