Race Driver: GRID unveiled

By Tom Bramwell Published 29 November, 2007

Details and shots.

Codemasters has announced that Race Driver One will from now on forever and ever be known as Race Driver: GRID (or just GRID if you're American).

Due out in the middle of 2008 for Xbox 360, PS3 and PC, GRID features races set in various cities around the world, including San Francisco, Washington DC and Detroit in the US.

You'll get to race V8 muscle cars around those, but things get a bit different in Europe and of course Japan, where drift racing is also addressed. In addition to street circuits, expect some proper race-tracks too. They're not a monster, Tim.

Ralph Fulton, the game's chief designer, says that Codies wants "to make racing exciting again". "This is not a game about collecting cars or spending all of your time in the front-end tuning suspension settings or designing liveries."

So what's it about then? "GRID focuses on everything that happens between the start grid and the chequered flag: the drama, the rivalries, the aggression and the crashes."

Executive producer Gavin Raeburn chimes in thus: "The next iteration of our DiRT engine combined with a decade of experience in developing driving games enables us to put the player at the centre of the action like never before.

"Damage, packed grids, intelligent opposition and unprecedented race day atmosphere will combine to deliver an experience like no other."

We shall see. In mid 2008. In the meantime, you shall we some quite splendid-looking Race Driver: GRID screenshots.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

You may also like...

Comments (36) Latest comment 4 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • homerramone #1 4 years ago

    Hope its more than 8 player !
    Howcomes we got 16 player races on xbox, but the 360 seems to have almost none (other than motogp)

  • seasidebaz #2 4 years ago

    oh my god my face has just melted from beauuuuuuuuuty

  • BradlayLaw #3 4 years ago

    Clever boys

  • AHiFi #4 4 years ago

    Yeah, had to comment too. Bloody nice looking game.

  • ligurmatic #5 4 years ago

    "expect some proper race-tracks too."

    There is hope.

  • seasidebaz #6 4 years ago

    i hope they don't include the nurburgring. 11 and a half minutes of grey and trees. and that floor grafitti. that i have been forced to drive on in EVERY BLOODY RACING GAME SINCE PGR2 / GRAN TURISMO 3!!!! (forgot which one came first hehe)

  • Beano #7 4 years ago

    Hopefully it will not be as choppy and glitchy as DIRT :|

  • AbyssUK #8 4 years ago

    Can we have a Tank?

  • Hughes. #9 4 years ago

    and a Flexmobile.

    I have a suspicion this will look amazing but only run at 30fps, as seems to be the way with Codies.

    Excellent AI though, if they could crank out a solid 60fps I'll be overjoyed.

  • seasidebaz #10 4 years ago

    30fps would be nice as that's the refresh rate of progressive-scan tv's
    edit: sorry, i mean that's how many frames a second prog scan can display, refresh rate is 60hz but you display same image twice for prog scan
    Edited by 1 at 29/11/07 @ 15:16

  • Darren #11 4 years ago

    Looks quite impressive from the static screenshots although I'll reserve full judgement on the game until I see it running. Previous instalments of the TOCA Race Driver series ran at 60 fps so it'll be interesting to see if this new game does, especially given how detailed it looks. It's looks comparable to PGR 4 graphically, possibly better, and that only ran at 30 fps... not that it mattered as it ran beautifully (mostly) and looked gorgeous anyway.

  • Darren #12 4 years ago

    @seasidebaz - What you on about... a 60Hz HDTV is capable of displaying 60 full-frames per second using progressive scan! If you use 1080i then you get 60 half-frames per second or 30 full ones. ;) LOL

  • seasidebaz #13 4 years ago

    used to work with a tv engineer who taught me the ways of hd...
    with progressive scan, you draw half the picture in one frame, the other half in the next frame, then present to screen. while this is showing you repeat the process of half screen, half screen, present. the trick is in the fact that consoles are "hd compatible" and not "hd compliant". the console can throw out 60fps but the tv will only show 30, otherwise they would be running at 120hz (which they don't)

  • Darren #14 4 years ago

    Huh???

    I'm afraid you're misinformed or you've misunderstood the TV engineer... a single frame is drawn entirely in ONE pass using progressive scan, seasidebazz, but it takes two passes if it's interlaced though (i.e. 1080i). As I said a game that runs at 60 fps at 720p is actually displaying 60 full-frames per second unlike the same game running on a standard definition CRT TV, which would be 60 half-frames ('cos it's interlaced). ;)

  • seasidebaz #15 4 years ago

    ok slightly wrong (not much though),
    720p will run at 25/30fps or 50/60fps

    1080i runs at 30
    1080p runs at 30

    720p at 60fps is a new thing though and older tv's wont support it

    and the half-half image thing is me forgetting what i was told hehe it's when an image gets de-interlaced on an hdtv

  • Zob #16 4 years ago

    Looks pretty nice from the screenshots, this! Not sure about the game's name though...

    Race Driver: GRID

  • Darren #17 4 years ago

    Yeah Race Driver: GRID sounds arse-about face to me, GRID Race Driver sounds better but even so it's still craptacular.

  • bioreit #18 4 years ago

    Me: "Miss Henderson?"

    Miss Henderson: "Yes sir?"

    Me: "Hold all my calls for the next...oooh, five years. My brain will be otherwise engaged in trying to control its excessive drool-rate."

    Edit 1: Edited for spelling due to the brane wurmz
    Edited by 1 at 29/11/07 @ 17:29

  • Ceatlan #19 4 years ago

    It better have qualifying, theres nothing worse than playing a racing game that constantly dumps you at the back of the grid for every race.

  • GamerAddict #20 4 years ago

    Screenshots look good

    But come on Codies, why the need to put capital letters after all your game names now?!?! DIRT, GRID.......what next? SPUD, SH*T, OUCH.....

  • El_MUERkO #21 4 years ago

    GRID ... like DIRT ... get'd

    i wonder if it'll have an annoying american guiding you through each level?

    I wish someone would take over the TOCA licence and make a next gen follow up to TOCA 1 and 2

  • SBfistfun #22 4 years ago

    Wow another racing game, how exciting.

  • effinjamie #23 4 years ago

    Soooo .... plenty of pandering to the Yanks then. Let's hope they include the Dump Truck racing from Dirt then!
    The screenshots look just like Burnout or the Need for speed series. Whats the betting this has an EA type Rad soundtrack!
    Edited by 1 at 29/11/07 @ 18:19

  • FooAtari #24 4 years ago

    @seasidebaz

    " i hope they don't include the nurburgring. 11 and a half minutes of grey and trees. and that floor grafitti. that i have been forced to drive on in EVERY BLOODY RACING GAME SINCE PGR2 / GRAN TURISMO 3!!!! (forgot which one came first hehe)"

    Wash your mouth out its the best track in the world, never get tired of it... Well the second best after the TT, but that's not a track.

    Anyway, what I came to say was, it was neither game. Grand Prix Legends was the first game to the feature the Nurburgring way back in '98. Still the best racing game ever.

    I don't really like the look of this. Screens just say NFS: Race Driver :(

    Give me a sequel to Toca 1 and 2 dammit. I want some BTCC action.
    Edited by 1 at 29/11/07 @ 20:48

  • OldB0y #25 4 years ago

    @FooAtari re:

    "I don't really like the look of this. Screens just say NFS: Race Driver :(

    Give me a sequel to Toca 1 and 2 dammit. I want some BTCC action."

    Couldn't agree more, Toca BTCC + the Aussie V8 stuff + European touring cars + real tracks from those respective series = okay.

    But please, no "Street racing", no "drifting", no trucks and pretty please with a cherry on top no pandering to the US market with some lameo EA extreme Sports style US voice over - at least not for the UK/Euro release - that nearly ruined CMR:DIRT for me.

  • andromeda #26 4 years ago

    "I don't really like the look of this. Screens just say NFS: Race Driver :(

    another +1

    yeah it looks like going all chav to me.
    looks more and more like theyre trying to reach out to the septics, first Travesty Pastrana and now GRID...its a shame

  • 3william56 #27 4 years ago

    Race Driver: YAWN

    Nice cathedral though. Hope they asked the Church to use it, because racing cars and crashing is the work of satan after all.

  • secombe #28 4 years ago

    I'm clinging onto the hope that...

    a) Simbin manage to stay afloat

    and

    b) They make another GTR or GTL game.

    Otherwise it looks as though we have a lifetime of driving around street tracks. Remember the days when you could actually drive around Castle Combe, Oulton Park etc?!

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #29 4 years ago

    Grand Prix Legends was the first game to the feature the Nurburgring way back in '98. Still the worst racing game ever.

    fixed. Unplayable toss, it was, and still is.

  • Darren #30 4 years ago

    Ah, it uses the DiRT engine does it...?

    /imagines the new Race Driver: GRID game being plagued with v-sync tearing

    Oh... :(

  • BadBoyBonner #31 4 years ago

    Well it can't be any worse than Need For Speed Pro Street and at least the Codies are trying something a bit different with the career and stuff.

    Plus any driving game with a decent rendition of San Fran in has got to be worth a punt.

    EDIT - why is it always so bloody easy to spot your mistakes after you have posted!
    Edited by 1 at 30/11/07 @ 11:26

  • FooAtari #32 4 years ago

    @secombe

    Simbin re doing alright I think. there is always rFactor to fall back on I guess.

    @ Mentalist(air)
    Im going to slap you ;) Whats the matter, to hard for you? I would imagine a 67 GP car was far from easy to drive. And as I understand it GPL provides a pretty accurate representation of it.

  • DodgyPast #33 4 years ago

    DiRT runs fine... on a reasonable spec PC at least :p

    From that I'm guessing the XBox 360 version of this should be OK, they didn't really need to tune it that much to make it playable.

    Strangely one of the few games where the engine is if anything more CPU bound rather than GPU... overclocking the GPU did nothing at 720p, but a 2.66-->3Ghz overclock meant it was smooth as silk, even with ten cars on screen at once.

    This will be rather more vital for GRID since you can understand rallying alone, but not track racing.

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #34 4 years ago

    I would imagine a 67 GP car was far from easy to drive

    Which makes it absolutely no fun as a game.

  • Caimbeul #35 4 years ago

    The dock side areas look nice but a little sterile. The crowd packs ares though look great, looks like it could have an atmosphere to it...something racing games tend to lack in the extreme.

  • themorganator #36 4 years ago

    If the handling is similar to Dirt, I won't get this and neither will the guys I race with. I'm sure it appeals to some and I have no issue with that. However, for me, Dirt was appalling! I use the 360 wheel and it was absolutely rubbish. The cars centrally pivot, displaying little or not concept of how a car game should work or handle. Forza (and to a lesser extent PGR) understand how a car game should play although I do accept Dirt looked good.

    Please Codemasters, sort the handling!