A major attraction of driving games, especially for automobile and racing enthusiasts, is their ability to transport us to places most of us will never reach in our daily lives—like the driver’s seats of powerful, expensive cars.
Unless I win a lottery (a big one), I’m never going to own a Porsche Carrera GT or a 12-cylinder Enzo Ferrari. The Porsche retails for more than $300,000, and the Enzo sells for more than $600,000 (and neither price includes the cost of registration, taxes, insurance, or the holiday and birthday gifts you’ll be giving to your local certified mechanic). Both can zip from 0 to 60 mph in less than four seconds, which is just a tick slower than the time it would take for a salesman to reject my credit application and escort me off the premises.
But with Project Gotham Racing 2®, you can test your driving prowess in autos like the Carrera GT and the Enzo on Xbox Live-based virtual tracks, competing against the clock and other wannabe owners. And the price is modest: a mere 22 Kudos Tokens for each car. PGR2™ has more cars than you can shake an exhaust pipe at (102 in all), ranging from mundane family-type vehicles, to classic American muscle-beasts, to racy SUVs and shapely, high-powered exotics from around the globe. There’s something for every driving style and racing taste.
PGR 2 has 14 classes of car. The following is a list of the classes and one example of the cars you’ll find in each group:
Compact Sports: Volkswagen New Beetle RSi
Sports Convertible: Mazda Miata MX-5
Coupe: Acura Integra Type-R (J)
Sport Utility: Chevrolet SSR
Pacific Muscle: Mitsubishi 3000 GT VR4
Roadster: Renault Spider
Classics: Toyota 2000GT
Sports Coupe: Cadillac XLR
American Muscle: Pontiac GTO
Super Car: Ferrari 360 Spider
Grand Touring: Lotus Esprit V8
Track Specials: Vauxhall VX 220 Turbo
Extreme: Porsche 911 GT2 (993)
Ultimate: TVR Cerbera Speed 12
Try’em Before You Buy’em For me, one of the game’s greatest features is the Showroom, where you can try out many of the game’s cars before you have enough Kudos Tokens to buy them. Take the time to find the entrance to the Showroom when you first get the game; it can be accessed from the screen where you select cars before beginning a race or starting a challenge. After you know where it is, it will become one of your favorite destinations in the far-flung world of PGR2, especially when you’re first starting the game and your choice of cars is restricted.
You move from showroom to showroom using a first-person camera, much like the Master Chief in Halo. Some of the showrooms display cars based on the manufacturer. Others are based on the car’s purpose, and some cars are grouped by country or region of origin. When you see something you like, you “walk up” to car and press the Test Drive button. Then the car is rolled out to the test circuit for your use.
You need Kudos Tokens to buy cars. Each time you move to a higher Kudos Rank within the game, you earn Kudos tokens. And the higher the ranking you attain, the more Kudos you earn. You don’t earn Kudos while test-driving cars, and your lap times are not posted on the Xbox Live leader boards, but you can run as many laps as you want around the course. It’s a great way to take a break and recharge your batteries when you’re stuck on a level. It’s like getting free, unlimited samples of foie gras and champagne while your kitchen is still stocked with nothing but cola and pretzels.
It can be inspirational: all those fast, exotic machines and a test track where you can take them for a spin. It will make you want to work that much harder to get the Kudos Tokens you need to make your virtual automobile dreams come true.
