Preview: 5 New Things We Learned About “DiRT: Showdown”

Since its introduction in 2007 as Colin McRae: DiRT, this oddly capitalized racing series has strived to be an ultra-realistic off-road rally game. But it also, starting with 2009’s DiRT 2, began including some unrealistic events, such as the car gymnastics “Gymkhana” modes in last year’s DiRT 3.

Now the good people behind the DiRT series are embracing this less serious spirit with the spin-off DiRT: Showdown, which replaces the authentic handling and physics for arcade-style controls.

Though as we learned when we got to play some of the game, and talk to the people making it, at a recent press get-together in Los Angeles, DiRT: Showdown isn’t just DiRT 3 with less realistic handling.

Unlike earlier DiRTs, Showdown’s races aren’t point-to-point contests where the best cumulative time crowns the winner. Instead, its races have you running multiple laps in hopes of coming in first. They’re still off-road, of course — complete with all the jumps, muddy patches, and uneven terrain you’d expect — but instead of racing against the clock, you’re racing against other drivers.

Adding to the adrenaline inducement is that some of the tracks are figure eights or clover shaped, which means you have to watch out for cross traffic when you come to intersection. Well, unless you like being smashed from the side.

That said, there’s more to this than just racing against other drivers. There are four different kinds of events, including an “Elimination” one where the slowest driver on a lap is removed from the race. In fact, when you add in the six other kinds of events (which we’ll get to in a moment), it turns out that Showdown has more game modes in than any previous DiRT.

Besides the racing modes, Showdown also includes a trio of “Demolition” events that are variations on the classic Destruction Derby. “We have ‘Rampage,” explains Associate Producer Iain Smith, “which is like ‘Deathmatch’ in that you respawn and it’s all about points, which you get from crashing into people and taking them out. You actually get more points depending on how hard you hit them, and where. If you hit the car on the side and t-bone them, you’ll get more points than if you hit them head-on, since t-boning them will do more damage to their car. You also get extra points if you’re the person who takes an opponent out.

“Then there’s ‘Hard Target’,” he continues, “which is kind of the opposite, in that everyone is after one person in particular, and if you’re ‘It,’ you’re trying to avoid hitting people and staying alive, since the winner is the person who stayed alive the longest.

“Lastly,” Smith concludes, “‘King of the Hill’ is kind of like Sumo Wrestling in that you’re trying to knock the other cars out of the arena.”

Along with the racing and demolition derby events, Showdown also has a category called “Hoonigan,” which are versions of the Gymkhana car gymnastics events from DiRT 3. “Based on the feedback we got from DiRT 3,” Smith explains, “we knew there were some modes we had to bring back.

“For example,” he explains, “we have one that’s kind of similar to the ‘Invasion’ one from the last game. You’re told, ‘Go after blue,’ and you have to drift around corners and take out the blue markers, and then you’re told, ‘Go after red,’ so you have to go after the red markers.

“Though ‘Head to Head’ is brand new,” he notes. “It’s actually based on Ken Block’s real life Gymkhana grid event. It’s two people tricking at the same time, which means you not only have to do the same tricks better than the other person, but have to make sure you don’t crash into each other at the same time.”

While some games have you use the same cars no matter what kind of event you’re running, Showdown takes the opposite approach. “There are three classes of cars to match the three modes,” Smith explains. “There are racing cars, Hoonigan cars, and there are destruction ones, and together there are about as many different cars as in DiRT 3.

“Though because of the destruction,” he notes, “the Hoonigan ones are the only licensed vehicles. That’s because the racing events are more aggressive this time. You’ll be able to take out your opponents, and parts of the cars will break off or be more deformed than in the past.”

It also helps that, for the first time in the series, cars come with the optional speed boost package found such fellow arcade racers as Need For Speed and Ridge Racer. And in Yugos. Though unlike in those games, your boost doesn’t magically regenerate over time. Instead, it magically regenerates when you do something cool. “It’s about player action,” Smith notes. “So if you drift around corners or hit other cars, you’ll get an incremental increase of boost.”

While Codemasters (the publisher) and Codemasters Studios (the developers) are fully behind DiRT: Showdown — which will be released on Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC in May (late May, if the European release date of May 25 is any indication) — they are quick to point out that, as we said, this is a spin-off, and not the next game in the series.

“This isn’t DiRT 4,” Smith notes. “DiRT is well-known for being fairly a sim-heavy off-road rally game. But Showdown is something completely different. It’s taking the action sports elements we introduced in DiRT 2 and DiRT 3 — especially DiRT 3 — and wrapping them up in its own game. So this is not DiRT 4.

“Though that game will come.”