When it all works, Project CARS is so good, it may as well be reality. One Touring Car race I had around Barcelona in the blazing sunshine was so utterly convincing, I felt like I'd actually been there. Even with 30 exquisitel🐎y-detailed cars jostling for position around this magnificent, sunshine-drenched, HD circ🥀uit, the frame-rate remained smooth and the overall effect equal to real life. It's everything a sim on your new-gen console should be doing: effectively recreating the real world.

If you've ever been to a real race track, you'll know that they're nothing like TV would have you believe. It's surprising how 'outdoorsy' they feel. You are, after all, standing in a field, looking at a ribbon 🀅of tarmac surrounded by piles of tyres and concrete kerbs. It's actually much less glamorous than you expect… but then a racing car zooms by and something undeniably magical happens. It's this 'real' experience that's reproduced in Project CARS, and there's nothing even remotely video gamey about it. It's the same feeling, only here it's you doing the driving.

So how is that driving? Well, in a word: difficult. When your tyres are up to a good temperature, there is sufficient grip t🍰o allow you reasonable confidence on the accelerator, at which point you can start to push your limits and have some real fun. Thing is, you don't start with hot tyres. If you exit the pits and pull the accelerator while the icons are blue (that means cold, of course), you'll slew into the wall and knacker your suspension. Fact. The practice and qualifying sessions require you to tiptoe around the track like you're on an ice rink (you may as well be) for a lap or two until your tyres are up to temperature. And ܫthis is where the AI first shows its suicidal tendencies.

While you're gingerly feeding in the throttle, it's quite normal to get punted into the air and even onto your roof because the AI is unable to avoid a slower car in pl🔴ain sight. Even during close-fought races, they'll go into the back of you under braking, they'll cut you up on the straights… I would say it's poor awareness of the player, but they do it to each other, too. Most races see mid-pack carnage at the first corner because, quite simply, the AI drives like a buffoon. When the knife edge of control is so thin at the best of times, trying to maintain control in a packed field is impo𒉰ssible and you'll see countless retries as you try to just get a decent start and survive the first lap.

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