I was looking forward to getting my hands on the first driving game from Codemasters after it was acquired by Electronic Arts. Codemasters is a mythical company with many works in the genre of driving with already well-known sagas such as Formula 1, the Dirt saga or the GRID saga, among others.
Now it’s the turn of GRID Legends, the new game with which they debut after the arrival at the start of the current generation of Dirt 5, a game that bets on what has been seen in previous installments, with no too many risks in its driving mechanics but if an evolution concerning the options and the possibilities of creating a strong and broad community bringing together all the platforms.
GRID Legends bets on the community as one of its main bases, from the first minute it will ask us if we want to activate crossplay or if we prefer to play only with players from our own platform. Quite a statement of intent to keep the game alive and kicking from the first few life bars, plus it makes sense that this is the way to go with a game that relies so much on the community for the various options and possibilities. which he offers us online. For everything else, this new opus relies on a formula similar to what we have seen in previous games, races where almost everything is allowed, a point a little more arcade than the last game, even for those of between us following the Codemasters path and playing their games every time they come out, this is the most “DIRT” GRID I’ve ever played.
technical part
On this occasion I can tell you that I played GRID Legends on Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S and just as happened with DIRT 5 we are facing a great optimization job on both platforms -forms, wherever you play it, you will enjoy it. Visually, the game offers a very high image quality, an evolution compared to previous works and, as it could not be otherwise, also compared to previous installments, we have a driving game with a marked air by the most aggressive and frantic competition.
In my first paragraph I explained that GRID Legends is committed to giving us a game suitable for all types of players who love arcade driving games, from the first bars we can choose the level of difficulty with which we want to take up our challenge and with it we will adapt the game to an appropriate level of demand.
Visually we are facing a neat game in all its aspects, we have a lighting system that stands out above many games in the genre, maybe I would only put the lighting system of Forza Horizon 5 above currently. The game maintains this visual level on Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S, on both platforms the game runs at 60 frames per second nailed and if we want we can opt for the 120 Fps mode if we have a screen who supports it. If we choose this mode on Xbox Series X for example, we will lose graphic quality, but we will gain twice as many images, so it will be up to you to maintain one option or the other.
In my case I have chose to play 60 second footage and maintaining the graphics quality, in the Xbox Series S I kept the standard configuration that it offers and played another 60 frames like rocks so no matter what platform you play it on you won’t have any optimization issues.
Some of the things that stand out above a great lighting system are weather changes, rain, and inclement weather conditions that sometimes make the game look spectacular. One of the things that I liked the least is related to impacts and damage between cars and the possibility of rewinding, it is true that you use this option if you wish, but I would eliminate it, because the temptation to use it is always very super when the dregs in part of the race.
Going back to damage, if I missed that Codemasters will move in this direction, in games like Dirt 2 (and later) they had a vehicle destruction system that caused you to gradually lose car parts, but like in dirt 5, in Grid Legends everything seems too established and a bit papier-mâché
gameplay
We have before us the characteristic gameplay that made this saga great, but with some nuances. The most important ones are related to the physics which has been adjusted from previous games, drifting is no longer such an important advantage as in other games and in this case it has been adjusted to the different types of cars and the way which they are manipulated. GRID Legends is an arcade game with the mechanics of a game that allows you to touch the settings of the car for driving.
The cars are sufficiently differentiated and well recreated so it won’t be the same to drive a supercar as a tailgate or one muscular, each of them will be different in handling and in the physics, in that sense it’s done quite well and takes advantage of the work of the previous games to evolve in that direction, now there is more difference in the handling of the different cars.
GRID Legends stands out for several game modes, on the one hand we have a campaign mode in which with real players we will have to enter as a novice pilot to take the team to the top. Common argument of many other games, but it serves to know the tests that will be found in the normal game modes and how to compete. In other words, the campaign will take us through different situations, tests and scenarios that will acclimatize us so that we can then access the rest of the competitive modes without being a beginner.
The scenarios are spread all over the world, we will compete in cities like San Francisco, Barcelona or real circuits like Suzuka, some of these scenarios we have already seen in previous episodes, but they have a better graphic finish and an evolution in their section of lighting, reflections and other small nuances that the new consoles use. We can also confirm that the game is compatible with racing wheels that are on the market for Xbox from major manufacturers, so if you want to take your gaming experience to another level, you can do so with GRID Legends and a compatible racing wheel.
Duration
You can be in front of the screen with GRID Legends for as long as you want, its campaign mode is nothing more than an appetizer that we can finish in just 4 hours and then the real competition will begin. We will have the different categories to compete with many tests, in addition we can choose from the first moment if we want to play the campaign or skip this stage and play multiplayer modes, play alone to test ourselves by overcoming races or whatever what we decide. The multiplayer mode in this review wasn’t too crowded with players, as the game wasn’t officially released for everyone, but we do have races with up to 21 players available.
We have hundreds of tests available, a large catalog of cars to enjoy, from classics to electric cars, in short and in quantity we cannot put it, but what GRID Legends offers, it comes to market with enough of content to keep us hours and hours in front of the monitor.
conclusion
GRID Legends is a delivery that, in a way, we can continue to catalog in the saga and that takes advantage of all the good things that it cherished to improve other things in which it had room for improvement . If you love Codemasters driving games, you’ll surely enjoy this new installment, and if you were expecting a long-running, fun and visually up-to-date arcade driving game, you’ll find it all in this title.
We can criticize some things like it could be more ambitious in physics and maybe even go further in the graphics section, but Codemasters knew how to take the right measures and did not compromise the solidity of the game in general, that you there play on the platform he plays. On Xbox Series X it takes advantage of its features, but it does it just as well on Xbox Series S, so wherever you play it, and as long as you take into account the type of proposal it offers us, you will find in GRID Legends enough arguments to take advantage of everything that is offered to you from the first minute.
We thank Electronic Arts for the material offered to carry out this analysis.
