I haven't bought a game on its release day for many years, but today I made an exception with Art of Rally, only because it looked so damn fun!
And it IS quite fun indeed! Art of Rally has kind of an arcade feel, but don't let the top-down view fool you - it's still a proper rally game that isn't as easy as it looks. Easy to learn, but hard to master, as the old cliche goes. You'll be spinning and hitting trees at first, but when you finally nail that perfect drift through a big curve, there's something extremely satisfying about it. I'm not entirely pleased with the driving physics; the gravity especially feels a bit off when my old Mini (or "the Meanie", as they can't use official names in the game) can make insane jumps and it just kind of floats through the air, but the semi-realistic handling at least feels good and most of all fun. There are lots of different cars and the few ones that I've tried so far have all felt a bit different, so that definitely makes things a bit more interesting.
Also, you might already have noticed that Art of Rally looks absolutely gorgeous. Seriously. It's minimalistic and ridiculously colourful, but to me it nails the indie game look perfectly. There's a very nice photo mode and I'm totally going to snap some screenshots of some of the lovely views in the game. Normally the first thing that I'd do in a racing game would be to turn off the music, but the retro synthpop soundtrack somehow fits in too, and you can still hear the engine roaring underneath it. Or perhaps the other way around. The track design is top notch and it follows the simplistic trend, but some of the locations are still truly beautiful and they're all pretty fun to drive. Some random obstacles or small rocks on the side of the road might make things more exciting though.
I still have a desire to play more realistic and serious rally sims after Art of Rally, but I already know that I'll be playing this a lot when I want something a bit more relaxing and fun.
