So I finally caved and bought the digital version of this game. I'm really glad I did because it's fun!
Online is still a work in progress but last night I logged in and played 3 online races with no problems whatsoever. Everything went silky smooth and it didn't take all that long to connect and start racing. To Evolution's credit, they do seem to be working around the clock to improve online. Yes it was a terrible screw up on their part but what's done is done. All they can do now is try to rectify their screw up, which they are obviously doing. I'm getting tired of the internet loud-mouth's who constanty ***** and moan about this game. It's getting better! If Evolution had simply washed their hands of this game and said "tough ****" then I could understand the continuous berating. But this game is finally at a point now where it works pretty damn good and they are still working to make it better. It's a shame that so many have already written it off because this game is the tits and it's only going to get better. Is it perfect? No but I do believe that once they get the online completely fixed, add in the dynamic weather, replay mode, photo mode, and do a little tweaking here and balancing there, this game will completely kick ass!
Graphically, it simply has no equal. It's as close to photo real as I've ever seen in a racing game! The more I play it, the more little subtle details I can pick out. The lighting is incredible too.
Handling IMO is awesome! To me it's pretty damn near the perfect balance between arcade and simulation. I LOVE the handling. It's tight and responsive without your car feeling like it's stuck to the track like Velcro. Drifting is a challenge but man, once you nail it it's so rewarding!
The A.I. in this game is tough. This game really makes you earn everything you get and I'm fine with that. One thing that always bored me with Gran Turismo was that essentially every race boiled down to you acquiring either the right car or the right amount of upgrades to your existing car that would allow you to blow right by the opponents. Not in this game! This game it's all about learning the tracks and developing skill! Every race feels intense and sometimes, even finishing 3rd or 4th feels rewarding. Plus I've never been a gear head so the lack of being able to set my car up doesn't bother me one bit!
My biggest gripe with the game so far is that it doesn't have a racing line. Instead, it uses different colored trackside flags to let the user know how tight a corner is (green, yellow, and red). While this works OK, sometimes when you're racing under certain times of day and certain lighting conditions it's hard to see what color they are. I hope Evolution decides to patch in a racing line at some point. It would go a long way in making tracks less of a challenge to get around.