10. F1 2012
Platform: PC, XBOX,PS3
The game features all twelve teams and twenty-four drivers competing in the 2012 season (except for mid-season changes), as well as the twenty circuits and Grands Prix — including the brand new Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas — included in the championship.
The game also features a brand-new "Young Driver Test" mode, a tutorial mode designed to introduce new players to the handling characteristics of Formula One cars as a prologue to the career mode. As a demonstration, Codemasters approached several drivers — including Mercedes test driver Sam Bird and GP2 Series driver Stefano Coletti — at the real-life Young Driver Tests (for drivers who have never started a Grand Prix) in Abu Dhabi in November 2011, and asked them to drive the Yas Marina Circuit in
F1 2012 instead of using the team simulators they would traditionally use to learn the circuit. All of the drivers who played the game reported that the game was realistic enough for them to learn the circuit to the point where they were confident enough to set competitive lap times.
The game also presents a new main menu, with Codemasters saying it is now easier to navigate around the video game. The sound system has been modified, and players can now hear other cars around them.
9. Dirt 2
Platform: PC, XBOX, Wii, PS3
This is the first game in the McRae series since McRae's death in 2007. It was announced on 19 November 2008 and features Ken Block, Travis Pastrana, Tanner Foust, and Dave Mirra. The game includes many new race-events, including stadium events. Along with the player, an RV travels from one event to another, and serves as "headquarters" for the player. It features a roster of contemporary off-road events, taking players to diverse and challenging real-world environments. The game takes place across four continents: Asia, Europe, Africa and North America. The game includes five different event types: Rally, Rallycross, "Trailblazer", "Land Rush" and "Raid". The World Tour mode sees players competing in multi-car and solo races at new locations, and also includes a new multiplayer mode.
8. Race driver: GRID
Platform: PC, XBOX, PS3
The game begins with the player accepting jobs to drive for other teams to earn money, and once the player gains enough capital they can purchase their own vehicles and drive independently, as well as continuing to drive for other teams should they choose to.
Grid features a gameplay mechanic known as Flashback which allows the player to rewind gameplay by up to ten seconds and resume from their chosen point. This is a limited-use feature, determined by the difficulty setting.
Grid features several modes of competition using various cars. Three main regions are found in the game, United States, Europe, and Japan, each with their own championship. Each of the game's 43 cars are tied to one of these three regions.
Grid also features several types of events to compete in, including GT championships, drifting, touge, open wheel racing, and demolition derby, as well as variants on several of these motorsports. Players can also participate in the 24 Hours of Le Mans at the end of each racing season.
7. Burnout Paradise
Platform: PC, XBOX, PS3
Burnout Paradise is the first game in the
Burnout series to be released for the PC.
In previous
Burnout games, "Crash Mode", was a dedicated mode in which players were given scenarios in which to cause the biggest crash. In
Burnout Paradise, "Crash Mode", now called "Showtime", can be initiated at any time and place in the game. Showtime does differ from the previous incarnation of Crash Mode being that instead of crashing into a busy intersection and watching a crash play out, Showtime has you bounce the vehicle around for as long as possible to gain points. During a race players may now take any route to get to the destination. Races and other events are started by simply stopping at any of the traffic lights and applying the accelerator and brake at the same time. The game features the ability to customize race settings, such as traffic, race routes, and including/excluding cars based on their boost types.
6. Blur
Platform: PC, XBOX, PS3
In
Blur's career mode, the player will encounter numerous characters and many licensed cars ranging from Dodge Vipers to Lotus Exiges to Ford Transit vans fitted with F1 engines, all of which have full damage modeling and separate traits such as Acceleration, Speed, Drift, Grip and Stability. Some special car models have been designed by Bizarre Creations themselves. There are also some heavily altered versions of familiar urban environments, such as the Los Angeles river halfpipe and several parts of London. These areas were altered to make the races more enjoyable instead of the developers having to strictly abide by each twist and turn. Depending on the character(s) the player races against or tags along with in team races, they will have their own racing styles, power-up set ups, match types, locales, cars and will be a part of certain fictional servers. As the player races well, performs stunts and uses power-ups in certain ways during races, the player will gain 'fan points'. These points help the player progress through the career, purchase more cars and parts and earn more fans for the user base.
5. Need for speed: Hot pursuit
Platform: PC, XBOX, PS3, Wii, Android
Hot Pursuit goes back to the
Need for Speed series' roots and takes on the gameplay style of earlier Need for Speed III: Hot Pursuit and
Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 titles in the
Need for Speed franchise with exotic cars and high-speed police chases. It is primarily inspired by the original
Need for Speed on 3DO.
Hot Pursuit lets players be either a racer or a police driver, and features a full career mode for both roles. The relationship between the cops and racers is described as "a dog chasing down a rabbit"; the police being more powerful while the racers are faster. Each side has several power-ups including calling for roadblocks and radar jamming. According to Criterion the single-player section is somewhere between 12 and 15 hours long, but with lots of replay value.
4. Split Second
Platform: PC, XBOX, PS3
Using the reality TV show premise, the game is broken up into 72 events across 12 episodes, with different modes available. One such mode, "Survival", has the player racing along a given track, while contending with a time limit and a series of trucks rolling colored barrels out of the back to stop the player reaching the finish in time. Blue barrels takes away seconds and red barrels result in instant death, followed by a respawn. Overtaking a truck will add extra seconds to the timer. When the timer runs out, the game goes into a sudden death phase where the next fatal impact will end the race. Another mode, "Air Strike", sees the player dodge incoming missile fire from a helicopter. The power-play gauge acts as a way to steer the missiles back at the helicopter in "Air Revenge", ultimately destroying it.
The game also has a multiplayer mode, with both 8-player online and 2-player split-screen offline available.
3. Gran Turismo 6
Platform: PS3
Gran Turismo 6 was announced on May 15, 2013, when Sony Computer Entertainment Europe hosted a celebration of the 15th anniversary of Gran Turismo at Silverstone Circuit in the United Kingdom. Kazunori Yamauchi said at the official announcement,
Gran Turismo 6 will feature 71 layouts of 33 tracks, 1200 cars, a new flexible rendering engine that features adaptive tessellation, and a redesigned simpler menu interface with faster loading times. An early build of Gran Turismo 6's updated physics were shown to the public when GT Academy 2013 was released on the PlayStation Store on July 2, 2013.
2. Forza Motorsport 5
Platform: XBOX
The game ships with 200 cars from over 50 manufacturers and 14 circuits including Spa, Bathurst, Yas Marina, and Circuit de la Sarthe. By comparison,
Forza Motorsport 4 shipped with approximately 500 cars from over 80 manufacturers and 27 circuits. Among the tracks omitted from
Forza Motorsport 5 include Nürburgring, Suzuka Circuit, and Sonoma Raceway. Forza 5, however, has almost the same amount of tracks and cars as Forza 1.
At E3 2013, first-hand gameplay, new features, and cars in "Forza Vista" mode were shown. Also at the event, it was revealed that for the first time in the game's history there would be open-wheel cars including the Dallara DW12 IndyCar and Formula One cars. The McLaren M23 driven by James Hunt and the Ferrari 312T2 driven by Niki Lauda in the 1976 Formula One season. The Lotus E21 driven by Kimi Räikkönen and Romain Grosjean in the 2013 Formula One Season was also revealed on November 5.
1.Need For Speed: Underground 2
Platform: PC, XBOX, PS2
In addition to the racing modes included in the previous
Underground game (Circuit, Sprint, Drag and Drift races), four new variations of races have been provided in
Underground 2. One racing mode was dropped, this being the Knockout competitions. Still, a Lap Knockout option is available when racing Circuit in non-career races.
Underground 2 is unique among the games in the Need For Speed series in that it requires players to drive to a certain place in the city in order to begin a race (other games allow the player to select a race from a menu). Most races are marked on the in-game radar, but some are hidden and the player must search for them, should he decide to play them.
