Last week or the week before was "Womens Day", they were promoting and celebrating as normal even when there is a full on world war in which hundreds of thousands of people are being killed. Its like we live in a version of the Truman Show. None of it matters, it all exists to exist, drain our funds freedom and more importantly time. Time you lose you never get back. Little bits at a time. In a 100 years they will wonder what people were doing during world war 6 and we would have been watching netflix.
The cognitive dissonance with everything online nowadays has gone so far that I wonder why people even do anything anymore. it seems that helplessness has blended in with ignorance is bliss. Nothing is certain, everything is a wait and see, maybe possibility, the sky might be blue or it might not. Information, misinformation, omissions, currying facts - everything is wild. I might have felt like this before but it more vivid now. The world can never be the same.
The older I get the more I narrow things into a path. Everything must be for a reason. Things could be worse. Embrace the struggle and move forward. Do not let people waste your time. Most people have hidden needs and wants. People lie, omit information. They bide their time until the next celebration. You need to navigate all the conflicting vectors towards a point of escape. The journey wont be easy and certainly not fast. Take your time.
I am not sure why I started playing this game right as I got it but I did. The game is pretty but not in a unique way. It is very linear. Super linear in career and cars are given to you or simply become unlocked into using a particular vehicle. Lots of rear wheel drive muscle cars which swing out of control easily on certain roads. It is a ok game so far but the tracks seem limited.
The loading times are long asf. Loading to race, loading the fancy menu - it feels almost as long as Skyrim. GRIDS2 has more realistic graphics than PGR4 but it is not as varied and there are no weather effects. In the first season of GRID2 you are stuck playing the same level multiple times. You eventually get shipped to Paris in Season 2 of the career mode but the repeating levels and linear career mode is very in your face.
The game feels good and fast in the city levels. Though when in the forest and coastal tracks it is easy to fly off the track or hit a solid road sign that will destroy your speed. The game has a limited rewind feature which can be used to cheat your way out of bad situations.
20 races in and I think I finally have a handle on the cars. The levels get better as well. The city levels in general are very pretty, especially in the later game - too bad no screenshot option. Loading times stay consistently bad. The graphics definitely make up for the long loading times. I will say that this is the best looking racing game I have played so far on the 360. There is not shortage on great racing games on the 360.
I had to change my camera view to "bonnet" because the 3rd person view swings too wildly causing me to under/over steer into every corner. Once I changed the view I was better able to handle the car around corners.
I think the issue with the game "seasons" is that you spend a few races on the same tracks until the end of the season. Once the season ends you get to get fresh new tracks and the circle repeats. The later tracks look good so its worth the temporary slog to see whats next. It is a lovely game and the night levels are really dark.
There are no weather effects which would have been cool but I figure that weather would be too much for this game engine and the 360. I am in the later part of the game now and everything is starting to come together. There are no more new tracks to see but I have quite a few vehicle challenges to complete. Vehicle challenges seem to be the best way to play because you are not interrupted by the NPC cars.
How it ended
Fun right up until it ended. Not a long racing game but there are extra things you can do to extend the playtime if you want to.
Conclusion
My rating 8.5/10. Definitely in my top 5 racing games on the 360. Lovely graphics, lovely night racing. No much weather but the sense of speed in the edge game cars is great. The announcer is a little annoying but you get accustomed to his random input. A nice arcade racing game to add to anyones collection. I would recommend it over Forza 4. No in game screenshot feature.
Strategy
I had to change the camera view because the 3rd person view made me crash "alot". Do all the promo events to ensure that you see all the special track locations. Though in the end you wont miss out on much by doing the bare minimum to unlock the next event. When the game ends it locks you off from the career mode so if you want to do and get everything the first time make sure you enter every challenge before you complete the season finals.
First impressions the game is pretty. I did select the option to lock the framerate at the cost of graphics. The world is detailed and has lots of things to loot but I hate having limited slots for my left hand abilities while still being able to carry infinite guns. The sound and lighting is excellent. It makes me question my whole concept of early gen games being bad since it came out in 2007.
As I got further into the game I got to buy more slots with cash. I gobbled them up quickly but even with enough money they limit how many new slots I could buy at one time. Then eventually limited the money I could keep in my wallet. Despite this limitation I did push on, listening to voice notes and checking corners for secret rooms as I did in DeusEx.
Conclusion
Its a good game. Sound design is excellent, voices everywhere. A bit too many weapon options and linear design. 8/10 would recommend.
Strategy
Play on easy. The game really has no strategy, its A to B stuff with a few hidden corners that give you extra stuff to add to your already OP arsenal of stuff. If I were playing on normal I would probably be constantly running out of stuff because of the max limits.
