GRID Legends - Review

Codemasters GRID series of racing games has been doing laps around the video game world since 2008 with the release of Race Drive: Grid, even longer if you count the TOCA series that the game stems from. The fourth installment of the game simply entitled GRID was released back in 2019, it was a solid racing game but still sat in the middle of the pack when it was measured up with other offerings at the time, Can GRID Legends the newest entry in the series set a new lap record? Or will it spin off the track?

The GRID series has mostly been about blurring the lines between arcade and sim motorsports, and that doesn’t change with the latest entry to Codemasters series with the release of GRID Legends. Starting up the game sees you have the choice of jumping into the story mode or heading straight into the career mode, there is no need to stress over which option you choose though as the main menu allows you to handily pick up where you left off in either mode whenever you choose to.

I elected to start off playing the story mode and I am glad I did as it serves as a showcase and tutorial of sorts for all of the race types and mechanics you will get exposed to in the career portion of the game. The story section of the game revolves around the Seneca Racing Team and it’s quirky but charismatic leader Marcus Ado, after the second driver for the team quit after practice just 3 days before the GRID racing season begins. This leaves room on the Seneca roster open and sees you step into the shoes of an amateur racing driver known simply as “Driver 22” vying for the open spot on the roster. Successfully complete a few tryouts for the team and you will be welcomed into Seneca racing as their new driver racing alongside already established team member Yume Tanaka. The story mode takes you through around 30 races showcasing the games various mechanics, locations and systems with each race having a goal you must beat before you can progress on to the next event.

You will also get to control a vast array of vehicles through the story from the Ford GT all the way through to Dumont T36 Brawler trucks, each vehicle controls differently from their counterparts and getting to play around with each of these vehicles through the story mode is a great way to get a feel for what will come later in the career mode. The story is presented through FMV cut scenes that happen in between each race and they are really slickly presented and feature high quality acting from the cast, it’s just a shame that the story itself is not that interesting, but in all reality it is a racing game so there is only so far you can go in terms of writing and keeping the story believable. As said before I am glad I played through this mode as it eases you into game mechanics you will be using extensively during the career mode, it would have been nice however if you could of customized your driver and cars a little bit in this mode instead of being simply known as “Driver 22” as this doesn’t lend for much investment in the overall story.

Career mode plays out exactly the way you would expect an arcade/sim racing game to, you progress through races in various locations with stipulations attached such as finishing in a certain position or staying ahead of the pack in elimination races where the last 2 drivers get eliminated once a timer counts down. It’s basically beat the track, get some cash, upgrade some things and move on to the next track. There are however a few mechanics here that lift the gameplay above standard racing game formula, the first of these is the nemesis system, which was also a big part of the last game in the series GRID. Some races start out with you having a nemesis already in the pack of racers and you can also obtain nemesis’ throughout races if you constantly bump into other races or ram them off the track, once a driver turns nemesis towards you they really do get very aggressive and will stop at nothing to ruin your day by sideswiping you and ramming you from behind, it is a well done mechanic and really does add a lot of tension and even strategy to the races as racing cleanly will ensure that you have a much easier time completing laps around the tracks.

In every race you drive you will also have a teammate who you can actively order around to do dirty work for you like nudge other drivers or to block them from passing amongst others, these abilities can also be upgraded through a skill tree as you earn money and experience from completing races, this is a really engaging system and one that I had a lot of fun with whilst playing the game. As expected there are also options to customize your race team logo and even your car, however these fall far short of the options offered in games such as the Forza Horizons series so if you are one of those people that spend hours designing car liveries then you might be very disappointed with the lack of options available here. There are also car tuning options and thankfully for all you tuner fanatics there are quite a few sliders to play with here ranging from gear ratios, spring tightening and anti-roll bars all the way through to setting the cars break bias. The same goes for difficulty, you can pretty much customize the game to help you out as much or as little you like by turning on or off options such as best racing lines, damage, ABS and traction control.

As far as other options go you have the ability to pick a quick race and drive in an event of your choice, find an online session to race against other players, though unfortunately I was not able to test the online portion of the game out as I couldn’t find any sessions available online during the period I played the game and I suspect this was only because I had an early access copy of the game. There is also the ability to create a race and then host the race online, this gives you access to a large amount of options in order to customise your racing experience and you can pick whatever world location you wish to race in and tinker from options such as the weather, the amount of laps, the type of vehicles allowed in the race and the amount of drivers able to join your online session, there are a lot of combinations available here and this should definitely elevates the game in terms of longevity.

Graphically the game is what you would expect from a racing game but to be honest for a game on the PS5 I was expecting a lot more, all of the world locations are varied and suitably different but texturally they tend to appear very bland and sterile. The car models are also lacking especially when compared to the detailed cars available in the Forza and Gran Turismo series. The game does run fluidly though and I never noticed a hint of slowdown whilst I was racing, no matter how many cars were on the screen. As far as audio goes there is nothing groundbreaking here, the cars emit suitable VROOM VROOM noises and the soundtrack while rather bland is also not terrible.

Racing in the game is an absolute pleasure, the cars are responsive when using the PS5s DualSense controller and if you have a racing wheel you are in for a treat. I plugged in my Logitech G29 and it instantly took my experience up another notch, the wheel emitted a pleasing amount of force feedback and you could really feel the track through the wheel, getting force feedback in a racing game to feel good is not an easy task so Codemasters deserve some props here, the only problem I had using the wheel is when using the games ‘back track’ mechanic where you can press X to rewind your race if you make a mistake, rewinding does not reset the orientation of the wheel so it is all too easy to rewind and then go flying straight off the track as soon as you resume, this can tend to get frustrating. Overall though this is a minor nitpick and Codemasters have really worked hard here to make sure the controls feel good no matter whether using the DualSense or a force feedback wheel.

GRID Legends is a good game, there is nothing really wrong with the experience here, I just feel with the imminent release of Gran Turismo 7 that it really needed to be a great game in order for it to even have a hope of not being overlooked. If you are a car racing fan that loves arcade racing more than you do sim racing then there is a lot to like here and I don’t think you will be disappointed at all if you purchase GRID Legends, if you only purchase one car game a year though and you are lucky enough to own a PS5 then I would suggest waiting for the release of GT7 before pulling the trigger on either game.

The Score

7.5

Review code provided by Electronic Arts

The Pros

+Large amount of locations and track to race in

+Story mode was a nice addition to help you grasp the games controls and mechanics

+Large amount of racing disciplines and cars

+Excellent race creator that has almost endless combinations and options

+Rivalry system and driver skill trees add strategic elements to the game

The Cons

-Car models and overall graphics feel too sterile and bland

-Car editor feels almost phoned in and is nowhere near up to the standard of other top racing games

-Longevity may be a problem for some people as the game doesn’t really give you much of a motivation to progress and once progression occurs it’s just the basic formula of unlock new track, buy new car