I don't own a driving licence
I never touched a steering wheel in my life
The last "rally" game I played was Collin McRae Rally on PSOne
I play mainly FPS

To be fair, nothing could have logically lead me to purchase this game. I even hate sports and driving games.
But, one day by the end of winter 2024-2025, I noticed a -60% discount on DR2 and took a good look at the pictures and videos from the store page. And I felt a weird urge to play it, inexplicably. It reminded me of my PSOne era and this car game running at a whoping 15fps, in which I couldn't finish a track before timer stopped, or because I managed to break the car. Yet I remember having so much fun playing it.


And today I can safely say DiRT Rally 2.0 is one of my most thrilling and enjoyable gaming experience of this decade.
The game is beautiful, the controller feedbacks are great, the sound is immersive, and the gameplay is addicting.

Now, it wasn't a walk in the park to transit from shooter games to this one. It litterally took me 4 hours to get used to the controls, the physics of cars, and the various road types. Honestly I almost refunded the game after my first attempts.
But I gave the forum a try and people were very helpful and supporting. So I kept trying and figured my favorite car and how to enjoy the game for good. I even went to wrcsetups.com to fine tune my beloved Ford Fiesta R2.
So, a big shoutout to DR2's community who achieve the impossible ahah.

As of today, I mostly play Time Trial mode on Rally tracks (I hate smooth asphalt !).


Eventually the game grew in me so much that I started to become picky about it. And yes, despite my love for it, I have a bunch of gripes to get off my chest :
- DR1 tracks aren't included apparently, you have to pay them as DLCs
- In my opinion, markups and signaling are awefully positionned or lacking in some tracks
- The UX in menu is terrible (no scoreboard menu on main screen, you can't go back to tracks choice directly etc).
- Penalties are odd : roll over a spectator, get 4s penalty. Go a little off the road, get 30s. Hold my beer !


So, in the end I'm glad I had those childhood flashbacks. It was well worth the shot.
The gameplay is a little tricky occasionnally and the game ressembles a Dark Souls on wheels then, but that's why it is so rewarding to play DR2 : the anticipation of failing a turn immediatly replaced by the sheer satisfaction of landing it perfectly. Pure adrenaline for 5 to 10min straight.
(Oh and be sure to put some ReShade on the game, it makes is even more gorgeous)