News

• Reviewed on: Xbox 360 (viewed on an HP PL4200N 42-inch plasma television in 720p mode)
• Also available for: N/A
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• The Good: Has a slew of extra features, including an online auction house, dynamic telemetry, a hire-a-driver mode, and a robust virtual photography app
• The Bad: A series of hour long endurance races loom at the end of the game like 12-car pile up (thank goodness for hire-a-driver)
• The Verdict: All hail the new king of the road in console car games
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Strange as it may seem, the terrific racing in Microsoft's marvellously deep and compelling sequel to the original Forza Motorsport for Xbox almost takes a back seat to the game's expertly designed "extra" features.

Take, for example, the auction house that allows players to trade cars. I thought it would simply act as a means to find the occasional bargain on some of the games more expensive vehicles, but this online car mart has turned out to be much more. Thanks to a powerful car painting module, which allows players to place intricate decals of their own design virtually anywhere they like on a car's body, Forza's auction house has become a place for creative types to showcase—and potentially profit from—their immaculate art.

I saw classic Porsches with original racing stripes, stunning murals placed on door panels, hoods, and roofs, and vehicles with recognizable brands dribbled all over their frames, each logo painstakingly recreated by dedicated players. (Some of these branded vehicles actually made me wonder if corporations are engaged in some sort of clever, new viral marketing scheme. A PT Cruiser plastered with Hello Kitty pictures can safely be chalked up to an ambitious superfan, but some part of me doubts that a New Beetle done up in the black and white of a police cruiser with a perfectly rendered Geek Squad logo stamped on its side was created by a gamer strongly enamoured of Best Buy's tech support team.)

Why play when you can watch?

Another oddly addictive bonus is the hire-a-driver feature, which allows players to employ a professional A.I. pilot to race on their behalf.

The most practical application of this feature is employing it as a means to avoid steering your way through the hour-plus endurance races that hover at the end of the career mode like a bad accident you can't avoid, but I decided to test it out much earlier. One night, before getting up to prepare myself a little midnight snack, I hired a wheelman to drive my Maserati GranSport in a quick four lap competition. When I returned to the living room I suddenly found myself caught up in an incredibly close race, vocally rooting for my hired driver as he kept a mere car length between himself and his nearest opponent in the final leg. I was markedly surprised at how intense it was to watch an A.I. race in which I had a vested interest.

The hire-a-driver feature also acted as an easy way to knock off a few of the hundreds of races we're obliged to tackle in the career mode. There's nothing like getting up to go to the crapper and returning to find another shiny cup on your trophy wall.

It's a non-stop, top notch photo-op

Forza Motorsport 2's photo-realistic cars, complete with shockingly authentic looking suspension, damage effects, and moving drivers, are hands-down the best I've ever seen in a game. And that's saying nothing of the tracks. I'm familiar with most of Forza's real-world circuits from other racing games, but I've never seen them look this good. Germany's classic Nürburgring course is simply stunning; each bump and pebble in the tarmac looks just as real as the gorgeous natural forest that surrounds the raceway.

In fact it's all so pretty that I found myself spending hours taking photos using Forza 2's powerful virtual photography application. Players can pause single player races at any time to snap off a picture, controlling everything from camera placement and focus to hardcore shutterbug settings like aperture, length of exposure, and contrast.

And if you tire of taking pictures, you can always watch a little Forza TV. An Xbox 360 feature first introduced in 2005's Project Gotham Racing 3, players can sit back and watch live, online competitions being raced by some of the game's very best players. Without a personal stake in the race's outcome Forza TV was for me less entertaining than it was enlightening—watching the way great players attack certain turns was highly educational.

Oh—and it's fun to play, too

It may seem peculiar that I haven't spent any time discussing the actual racing, but it's only because the kind of hyper-realistic car physics found in most triple-A racing sims are now mostly interchangeable.

If you played the previous Forza or any of Sony's blockbuster Gran Turismo games you'll find the car handling in Forza 2 to be quite familiar. Similar cars with different weights, engines, suspension systems, and tires can show vastly different performance characteristics on the track, making the nearly limitless upgrades and tuning available in the game key to getting the most out of your ride.

There's little more to say. Forza 2 uses a tried-and-true formula that Microsoft has wisely avoided tampering with too much—save the odd tweak for true gearheads, like a comprehensive set of dynamic telemetry data that can be viewed during races, allowing hardcore players to examine information like downforce and wheel stress on the fly.

A new king is crowned

I live in a time when gas costs over a buck a litre and in a city where $10 per hour parking is the norm. To me, owning a car seems the height of luxury. I'd much rather use the subway for my real life transportation needs and spend $70 on a game that allows me to experience the virtual thrill of racing a Mini Cooper S through the empty streets of Manhattan or a souped up Shelby Mustang through the famous chicanes of the Laguna Seca raceway. And while there are plenty of games that deliver on both of these counts, Forza Motorsport 2's stunning visuals and unique and addictive extras makes it the current king of the road.