UPDATE: Boom! It’s here! Six minutes of Nürburgring action (race starts 40 seconds in, sorry) – and it ends with a bang!
It’s even better in real life than in the pictures.
The three-screen mode of play is simply phenomenal, and if you listen carefully you’ll hear the sound of car nut’s engines revving in anticipation. I’ve just come back from the local launch event, where we got to get hands on with one of these beastly setups.
Read on for a detailed examination of the pros (and pros) of this ultimate driving experience (they are Samsung’s latest LCDs too).
Three 360s, three 40-inch Samsung M8 LCDs; one kick-ass racing chair with Xbox 360 steering wheel (which, let’s not forget, was designed in part by the Forza developers). That’s around $15,000 worth of kit, but OMG it is the best driving experience I have ever had. Except the time I got to drive a V8 Supercar… but that’s a different story.
This actually shows up the shortcomings of nosecam race view in a standard config (I feel more justified in my general use of driver / chase view than ever). But this setup is how racing games were meant to be experienced. The side views are meaningful! You get a real sensation of speed, and you get a much better feel for where your corners are, with a more direct sense of the relationship between you, the road, and the wheel.
And the wheel is now delivering everything it has promised. PGR3 was good, but this is the first game to land that genuinely supports everything that wheel can do. I’m not bad at racing games, nor am I great at them, but between the wheel and this immersive screen arrangement, I was instantly a lot better than I recall ever being before. It all just comes together and really sings.
Now the sad part. Going back to a much more sedate gaming arrangement… time to save some dough – or win a lottery.