Give driving simulator a go... you'll love it

OH no, just what the PS2 needs - yet another driving simulator.

It may seem like heresy when I'm talking about the latest in the highly acclaimed TOCA series but I must profess to believing there was nothing more to be wrung from the motorsport genre on the Sony platform.

What with Gran Turismo tucking up the real-life end of things, World Rally Championship and Formula One 2002 nicking the motorsport honours and Burnout making off with the arcade action title, it seemed there was nothing more to be done.

Codemasters does at least have a decent pedigree. Its two major racing franchises (touring cars and the Colin McRae rally games) were among the very best on the old PlayStation.

Heck, the TOCA games even allowed virtual racers to burn rubber on the Croft Circuit, near Darlington, and, having done it for real, I can vouch for the fact that they were very accurate too.

The North-East links are even stronger this time round thanks to the inclusion of MG-Rover works pilot Warren Hughes, who hails from Sunderland.

Warren - who is young enough to be a product of the PlayStation generation - knows all about accuracy in video games.

A few years ago he used a PlayStation to help practise his lap times ahead of the Le Mans 24 hours race. When the tabloid press found out (via a story that first appeared in The Northern Echo) he made national headlines.

Still, it was always going to take more than a virtual Warren and a detailed recreation of Croft to really get me revved up about TOCA Race Driver.

First surprise when the game loads up is the lack of extraneous detail. There's no Grandstand-style scene-setting, no hideous "background" music to your races and no way of stacking the odds in your favour if you find the racing a bit tough. Codemasters has stripped all the fluff away and what's left is genuine hardcore racing.

In fact, TOCA Race Driver probably has more in common with the highly thought-of Driver series than its immediate predecessors.

Why? Because Codemasters have used the racing as a jumping-off point for a movie-style narrative that's played out through lengthy cut-scenes that you watch before and after each event.

Sure, it's a bit cheesy (your character is a young turk called Ryan Mckane who follows his dad's footsteps into the sport even though Pop died when he was deliberately punted off the track by a rival - can you cut it where Dad failed?) but it's fun and diverting.

After a while it feels like you're in a real-life Hollywood blockbuster. Thankfully, it's got more in common with Days of Thunder, the Tom Cruise NASCAR number, than Driven, Sly Stallone's appalling attempt to "do" CART racing which would have you believe a race can still be won even if your car only has three wheels.

What's more the plot changes according to your dexterity with the joypad's thumb sticks.

Winning a race plays out a different piece of the movie than if you finish last or, more likely, crash into a gravel trap after getting into a corner too hot.

McKane starts off in the British TOCA touring car championship driving for a small-time team with big ambitions. Provided he's good enough (i.e. you can finish the season high enough up the table) McKane gets offered a better drive the following season.

If it all goes to plan, the plot sees McKane climbing the career ladder all the way up to world championship level. Sadly it's not Formula One (Codies don't have the license) but by then you won't care.

Every TOCA game has been praised for its attention to detail and this latest version is no different.

The first time I exited a hairpin bend to see another car spinning through the air as it barrel rolled ahead of me it looked so realistic I couldn't help but give an involuntary shout of alarm in case it harpooned my own vehicle.

The "in car" camera view is fantastic and the realistic damage model means your windscreen cracks, the bonnet deforms and, in extreme cases, sometimes flies off or starts to rattle loose.

This is the type of thing that critics of Gran Turismo have been begging Polyphony to implement in the next instalment of that series. It really does elevate TOCA Tour onto a whole new level of realism.

It's a week after starting TOCA Race Driver with a heavy heart and now I'm hooked. By weaving a compelling plot into an excellent race engine and painting it all with sublime graphics, Codemasters has done it again. This game deserves to revitalise a moribund genre.

Don't be put off by the surfeit of substandard driving clones available for PS2 - this game is out of the top drawer and deserves a place in every gamer's collection.

Virus Watch

>Oror is a nasty - but, luckily, not widespread - virus which is able to disguise itself in emails containing a wide variety of text and subject lines, making it very hard to spot. As well as the usual mass-mailing and infection tactics, it also tries to corrupt the operation of anti-virus programs that aren't up to date (but not F-Secure's program). What's more, it also tries to install a backdoor "spy" programme which allows your computer to be remotely monitored over the Internet. Nasty, but with the usual precautions and up-to-date anti-virus software, there's no risk.

* For more information, free downloads and updates, visit www.f-secure.com

Published: 20/09/2002