Grid Legends is supposed to bring the racing game series back to its former glory, but its success stands and falls with the story.
I admit, I’m a simulation freak when it comes to racing games. It can’t be realistic enough for me, and if I had the wherewithal, one of these grandiose cockpit simulators would have been in the game room long ago. But: Forza Horizon 5 just impressively proves that there is a large group out there that has a lot of fun with racing games if it offers a mixture of realism and arcade driving physics.
This is exactly the target group that Grid Legends wants to serve again next year. Again, because the Grid series has been satisfying this demand for semi-realistic driving fun since 2008 and thus significantly longer than Forza Horizon. But the last part of the series in 2019 was mediocre at best, as our test at the time also proved
Grid Legends is supposed to be the comeback of the series: We were able to try out the racing game and took a look at the innovations for you – except for the story, which is a great pity. The story is supposed to be the heart of the game and can perhaps deliver what Grid Legends is still missing: a real unique selling point.
Table of Contents
What can you expect in Grid Legends?
During an online event, developer Codemasters showed us detailed insights into the new racer in the form of game director Chris Smith. In addition, we were able to play a preview version at our leisure over several days, which already included many events.
The most important facts about Grid Legends at a glance:
- Release: February 25, 2022
- Steering Wheel Support: Yes, as usual for Codemasters games, steering wheels are fully supported.
- Crossplay: Yes, you will be able to cross-play across all platforms.
- Cars: At launch you will have 130 cars from 9 different classes at your disposal, for example GT cars, trucks, open wheelers and drift cars.
- Tracks: 22 courses, including 13 permanent race tracks, 9 road races and one start-finish track.
- Game Modes: You can put your skills to the test in 9 different modes, including Elimination, Multi-Class, Electric Boost and brute-force Truck Stadium.
- Multiplayer: Compared to the predecessor, the starting field has been increased to 22 players.
Chris Smith confirmed that Grid Legends will not contain any microtransactions. Although there will be a deluxe version of the game and DLCs in the form of a Season Pass after the launch, it is also important not to exclude anyone from the racing fun.
If you join a race in multiplayer mode that requires DLC content, you can still participate. It’s only in single player that you actually have to own the post-launch content.
The ultimate racing game kit?
You can’t accuse Grid Legends of lacking in scope already. In the course of your career, you can compete in 250 events, plus an extensive multiplayer and a powerful event construction kit. This allows you to create races according to your own rules, including:
- Discipline: Do you want to race over a classic circuit or would you rather organise a drift event? Or how about multi-class racing?
- Car class: Which cars should be able to take part in the event?
- Location and route: At which location and on which route variant should the race take place?
- Weather conditions: Grid Legends offers not only sun and rain, but also storms and even snow.
- Laps: How long should the race last?
- Riders: How large should the starting field be?
If you want to create your own custom races, Grid Legends should be a dream come true for you. By the way, you will also be able to drive these custom events in multiplayer together with your friends, so fun PS evenings are guaranteed.
Keyword multiplayer: Grid Legends has a pretty cool drop-in feature. This means that you can even join a game in progress and keep a friend company. The prerequisite for this, however, is that you always have a couple of AI drivers competing in the multiplayer races.
Graphics and sound on top level
Technically, Grid Legends does not show any weaknesses even in our pre-release version. The in-house first-person engine also acts as the engine here and conjures up beautiful images on the monitor. We especially liked the lighting and reflections. Those with a weaker system can adjust the visuals thanks to the usual extensive graphics menu.
All the cars we drove delighted our ears with rich engine sounds – even in the cockpit perspective, which often drags down the audio quality in many racing games. Only the background music still has some room for improvement.
Story production along the lines of Netflix
In the past, racing game fans were content to stare at the most informative loading screen possible between two races in the career. But today, even in this genre, deep, emotional stories are to be told, and Grid Legends wants to set new standards here.
What’s it about? You slip into the role of Driver 22 – the protagonist deliberately has no name and will also remain silent throughout the game in order to preserve the diversity of the player community. After all, you don’t know who is sitting in front of the screen, and the developers want to prevent personal immersion from being destroyed by inappropriate voice-over.
You are the driver and owner of your own racing team and take part in a championship in order to reach the top. On your way to the top, however, you have to deal with all kinds of rivals. The story is to be driven forward by many cutscenes, for which even real actors appear in front of the camera. Among others, Ncuti Gatwa, who some of you may know from the series Sex Education, will be involved.
The staging of the plot is said to have been heavily inspired by Netflix documentaries, according to Codemasters. In particular, the well-known F1 documentary Drive to Survive is likely to have been the inspiration. Brad Kane, who already co-wrote the PlayStation exclusive Ghost of Tsushima, is responsible for the plot.
The documentary style arouses curiosity for more and could tell a strong, but also informative story – however, this staging already caused discussions in Age of Empires 4 because many players found it too distant. The silent protagonist could also contribute to this. On the other hand, we don’t want it to turn into a cheesy racing soap opera.
The trailer at the beginning of this article offers you a first taste. Unfortunately, our preview version did not yet offer access to the campaign. So it remains to be seen how good the story will be.
How does Grid Legends play now?
Up to this point, our preview reads extremely positively, which may surprise you due to the introduction. That’s why we’re now turning our attention to what is probably the most important aspect of a racing game: the driving physics and what happens on the track.
And here, unfortunately, we cannot yet break out in euphoria. Yes, Grid Legends offers action-packed races from the very first second, which are entertaining. However, the driving physics often produce strange blossoms and in many places do not feel as rounded as you are used to from the arcade competition.
We deactivated all driving aids such as traction control and brake assistant and still had the constant feeling that some system was still gripping the steering wheel. This is most obvious in longer curves. Either it is almost impossible to get the car to oversteer as intended, or it makes a full turn at the slightest turn of the steering wheel, which is almost impossible to control, at least with the gamepad.
The collision behaviour is also only partially convincing. When we scrub the paint off the doors of other cars, it feels nice and powerful without hindering our driving too much. But every contact with the barrier is a surprise. Sometimes we don’t even lose speed and simply accept the kiss from the wall, at other times our car gets stuck abruptly at the slightest touch and we have to watch helplessly as our opponents speed past us.
Everything depends on the car
However, this out-of-round driving experience is highly dependent on the cars. While GT cars and open wheelers are much better and therefore much more fun to drive, the trucks and especially the prestigious prototype Aston Martin Valkyrie raised both eyebrows. Since the game is still in the fine-tuning phase, there is still room for improvement.
There is also light and shade in the AI and the much-praised nemesis system. What we really liked: Our opponents also fight each other, and they do so with a hard line. This caused cars to suddenly turn in front of us, we had to dodge, get on the grass ourselves, and the course of the race changed completely as a result.
But the AI hardly fends off our attacks yet. If you’re good on the brakes, you can easily brake past three or four opponents in the corners. On the other hand, things are much more offensive, but also clumsier: if an AI car catches up, it slams into our rear with full force. If you don’t set the damage system to optical, you will probably not finish many races.
If we drive too hard on the track, we will soon make enemies. These rivals are much more aggressive in duels, they even try to push us off the track or into other cars. The system is cool, adds extra spice to the races and, most importantly, is supposed to work across races.
The story could make the difference between winning and losing
KI and driving physics may still change – but what won’t is Grid Legend’s dependence on the ambitious story mode. If you remove it from the equation, the bottom line remains a fun, but also almost kit-like racing game that is more likely to convince in multiplayer mode than in offline races.
Of course, this criticism could also be levelled at some of the Dirt parts that also came from Codemasters. There, however, the thrown-together car classes, tracks and modes were at least atmospherically spiced up by a stylish presentation. Grid Legends only offers dull menus to the eye.
But if the storyline is convincing, it could become the soul fron Grid Legends and offer racing game fans something they miss in Forza’s fluffy festival story and in other racing games. The potential is there for the best spin-off since 2008, but also for a fun but somehow characterless arcade racer. And the series doesn’t deserve that.
Editor’s Verdict
Grid Legends reminds me of the buffet at numerous weddings and Grandma’s 80th birthday: something for everyone, but everything only lukewarm. It tastes good and fills you up, but your palate knows better. That’s how I feel about the game
Codemasters has visibly made an effort to cater to every type of player and to eliminate the weaknesses of the predecessor. Did the originality fall by the wayside in the process? Only the ambitious story can answer that question, because it could be the big cherry on top of the whole sundae.
The scope is great, the graphics pretty, the soundscape excellent. But the races themselves are not yet better than decent, which is also due to the bumpy driving physics and AI. If the developers improve this by the time of release, we will have a very successful, entertaining arcade racer on our hands.
And now if you’ll excuse me, I’m hungry!
