WRC 2 2011 Game Review

This WRC 2011 game is the second instalment in Black Bean Games official WRC rally series for PlayStation 3, XBOX 360 and PC. After a generally unimpressive first attempt last year many people have been sceptical about how good this latest version will be. The original wasn’t all bad but it did appear quite dated with average graphics and it didn’t offer players anything new. With games manufactures like Codemasters always looking to push the boundaries of racing games with cutting edge graphics and numerous new features, for Black Bean to simply bring out what looked like an updated version of the old PS2 series simply isn’t good enough.

So have they learned their lesson with this 2011 edition of the game, surely they won’t just make a few minor updates for the 2011 WRC season and send it out as a new title right?

SimRacingGames WRC 2 Review Rating: 78%

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Hmm, well once behind the wheel one of the first things you notice is they’ve kept the same annoying and aggressive co-driver who screams every time you crash and gives you a stern telling off if your not going fast enough, enough to bring small children to tears. As far as we can tell it’s the exact same co-driver speech and comments as the original. Not very realistic.

One of the key features we much mention in this review is of course the handling which surprisingly was one of the first games better features, the physics weren’t too bad and probably a little better than Dirt 2 which was it’s main rival at the time. It was a shame the driving experience was spoiled for wheel users by very poor force feedback, so bad in fact that I had to turn the effect down really low in order to play the game. WRC 2 actually has slightly improved handling physics but we still found the force feedback disappointing and simply not up to the standards of other modern racing games and sims. I guess developing sophisticated force feedback effects can require the input of real world rally drivers like Codemasters used on Dirt 3 and perhaps Black Bean didn’t go to this trouble. As with last years effort it is still at least trying to be a sim which we give it credit for but if they are aiming at the more hardcore sim racers then they need to get the FFB and wheel settings perfected.

For rally fans who intend to play the game with a joypad these issues won’t effect you, it plays good with the controller and the cars respond well but if your looking for a pick up and play, action packed game your better off going for Dirt 3.

The presentation which was extremely basic in the first game has hardly improved at all, the menu screens still look dated. In game the graphics have been updated a little but when you compare them to other racing games of recent months like Dirt 3, Shift 2 and F1 2011 it’s hard to believe WRC 2 is from the same era. For me the general issue is Black Bean have been trying to make an OK game, not a great game. They’re just trying to do enough to make the game acceptable and sell, and these day’s gamers expect and deserve more for their hard earned money. You also have to question if Black Bean and Milestone really “get it” when you see the release date is 14 October 2011, the same day as Forza 4 in most countries and only 3 weeks after F1 2011. Even if the game was better this will cause many people to overlook it.

WRC 2 offers 78 stages over 13 different countries and there are now 5 super special stages where drivers go head to head. You can now drive a wider range of rally cars including classics from as far back as the 60’s. Personally I’ve always found the FWD (front wheel drive) cars in most rally games boring to drive, the classic RWD drive cars should hopefully be the opposite with lots of side ways action.

In summary WRC 2 is just an update of an OK game, it hasn’t truly addressed the problems of the original, just made slight tweaks. If you were a fan of the first game and really want the new 2011 rally cars then you should enjoy this but if you buy it expecting a huge improvement and all the issues fixed you will be disappointed.