Dirt 5 review

Dirt 5 is the game for you if you're seeking for the virtual equivalent of a delicious, uplifting snack. It might turn off players who are addicted to super-realistic car handling and limitless customization choices, but those players aren't the target market for this game.

Who and what is Dirt 5 intended for? We often wonder, running stone-faced over forgotten gravel. We don’t know the answer, and I’m not sure Codemasters does. After all, this is a series that made a name for itself by bringing some extreme sports culture to the Colin McRae Rally series, which was just starting to heat up a bit in 2007. Colin McRae: Dirt was cool and fun, with the ability to throw rhythm notes out the passenger window and do a doughnut just because you felt like it.

The problem, if you can call it that, was that Dirt Rally and its sequel had recently come out. The beautiful and simple Dirt Rally. While Dirt decides which backpack to wear for a night out in the RV drinking beer with the brothers, Dirt Rally finishes its geography homework and puts away the PE kit for the morning. The thing is, it’s absolutely fantastic. It’s so good that it reminded us how much we miss the pace, the ultra-realistic off-road driving and the drizzly Welsh tracks.

Which leaves #5 without a clear raison d’etre. All the core elements of the game, its Dirt essence, were conceived as a deliberate departure from realistic simulation-oriented driving. But now that Dirt Rally 2 enjoys a passionate community and that esports are catching on, realistic simulator-style driving is precisely what gets the attention. We are here presenting all of the information on our Dirt 5 review.

System Requirements

Requires: 64-bit processor and operating system
OS: 64-Bit Windows 10 (18362)
Processor: AMD FX 4300 / Intel Core i3 2130
Memory: 8 GB RAM
Graphics Card: AMD RX 480 (DirectX12 Graphics Card) / NVIDIA GTX 970
DirectX: Version 12
Network: Broadband Internet connection
Storage: 60 GB available space
Sound Card: DirectX Compatible

Dirt 5 review: Gameplay

Dirt 5, however, offers a much more diverse range of events than in the past. There are point-to-point stages, but not conventional rallies. Most events, apart from the occasional Gymkhana excursion, run alongside other competitors. There are no pace notes or service stops; wheel-to-wheel racing takes center stage. This includes everything from conventional rally cars to trucks, baby carriages and other vehicles designed for the most intense off-road racing imaginable.

This aspect is best reflected in the game’s Stampede races and Path Finder time trials, on extremely treacherous courses with rough, rocky terrain and absurd elevation changes. This is where the cues from Motorstorm, a title the team worked on years ago when it still belonged to Sony, emerge.  If all that doesn’t sound hard enough, this time you’ll also have to deal with a dynamic weather system that transforms races from start to finish. Almost every campaign in Dirt 5 ends in a completely different place from where it begins.

An idyllic sunset may give way to an unexpected downpour as night falls; a blizzard may clear and expose the asphalt under the snow as the sun comes out and bakes the ground. Before Dirt 5, the guys at Code masters Cheshire gave us Onrush and Drive club, two games with industry-leading weather effects. Dirt 5 does well to continue this legacy.

Dirt 5 review: Arcade

While DIRT 5’s career is a fun single-player experience, the Arcade mode will be the highlight of your living room, as it features something that has gone a bit out of fashion in racing games in recent years: offline multiplayer! Split-screen mode allows you to race against three other people and is a lot of fun. We tried it with two other players, as you can see in the image, and it was surprisingly easy to follow, even on my small TV.

Aside from split-screen, all story modes are available to play on the game’s 70 different courses, and if you want to get some practice or just spend some time playing with a certain type of race, you can do that here. With the ability to change the number of laps, type of event, time of day, and weather, you can try almost everything the game has to offer without having to follow the entire story.

Dirt 5 review: Performance

Dirt 5 looks phenomenal. We tested the game on my PC, with an Nvidia GTX 1070 GPU and a Ryzen 7 2700X CPU, and the overall look of the game is very good, running between 50 and 65 frames per second at 1440p at medium-high settings. There is some stuttering, especially at the beginning of races when the entire group of cars is in front of you, spraying mud and filling the screen with all sorts of carnage, but this subsides once you get to the front.

It is not the best game for less powerful cars, but since this is an intergenerational title, this is not surprising. Since Dirt 5 is not yet available to the public at the time of this writing, we do not have a clear idea of what the most talented members of the community will be able to create.

However, Playgrounds seems to offer plenty of leeway to create some really crazy stuff, thanks to an intuitive click system and many different types of tracks and objects with which you can fill the environment. Normally, track editors have a strict and often severe limit to the geometry you can fit into a given space, but the memory available in Dirt 5 seems luxurious. We’ll see what happens when the community starts testing these limits.

Conclusion

In recent years, there has been a great lack of big-budget arcade racing that was both fun and pushed the technical limits. In that sense, Dirt 5 is exactly the game the genre needed and comes at the perfect time to coincide with the PS5 and Xbox Series X.

From a single-player perspective, Dirt 5 is not as expansive or unpredictable as it makes you believe, and the multiplayer experience could really use private lobbies and true cross-play functionality.

But these are downsides that do not detract from the experience when the rubber hits the gravel, which is absolutely delightful. Dirt 5 is a candy-coated arcade rally tour de force. It is fun, but it is not watered down or simplistic in how accessible and immediately enjoyable it is.

George Southwell
George Southwell
George Southwell is a seasoned content editor at Bollyinside, renowned for his expertise in simplifying complex tech topics. Specializing in "Tips and Tricks" articles, he excels in breaking down iPhone, Android, hardware, and software insights. George's insatiable curiosity fuels his hobby of testing the latest tech updates, keeping him on the cutting edge.

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There has been a severe absence of high-budget arcade racing that was entertaining and pushed the boundaries of technology in recent years. In this regard, Dirt 5 is exactly what the genre needs, and its release on PS5 and Xbox One SX coincides with the perfect moment.Dirt 5 review