It’s been nearly 3 long years since I got my hands on a new Codemasters rally game and I must say I’ve missed getting my axels dirty, and with no new Rallisport challenge on the horizon this is Mr McRae’s chance to dominate the mudslinging race market for a while. The last few McRae Rally games have been slickly presented but DiRT really excels, with attractive menus and race selection screens, and a string of your career stats displayed as you load an event (which I suppose is fine as long as you aren’t a terrible driver).

Championship is a slightly leaner version of the classic McRae Rally mode, with National championships (Italian, German or UK), a European championship and a Global championship to win. There are some cool cars to drive, but sadly no current WRC cars, and the Citroen C4 concept (with its glass roof) and the stunning New Stratos (mid-engined rear wheel drive) are about as likely to really go rallying as I am to go run a marathon.

Rally World encompasses all the other types of discipline; CORR, Crossover, Rally Raid, Rallycross and Hillclimb. You can do a single race with any suitable unlocked vehicle, time trials or make up your own mini-championships with a series of races – there’s even a ‘randomise’ button - both nice ideas.

Added to the insane level of detail, and typically for a McRae game, you can seemingly severely damage each and every corner/panel/wheel/window/nut or bolt, and a heavy high speed crash resulting in a rollover can totally destroy a vehicle, with wheels, body and suspension parts, smoke dust and shards of glass going every which-way – once the disappointment of losing is over a horrendous crash is a joy to behold in the excellent replay mode (complete with Fast-Forward, Rewind and Slow-Motion buttons). The scenery looks lush too, with massive draw distances and richly detailed buildings, structures, trees and other flora. DiRT’s ummm… dirt effect is really good too, vehicles progressively get grubbier and grubbier as a stage/race progresses, and should you knock a panel off even the chassis underneath shows dirt – an impressive bit of attention to detail. Mostly the game looks superb and sticks to 30fps, but the particle effects are the only bit of the game that don’t really look “this gen”, there still isn’t enough dust billowing around and now and then horizontal tearing raises its ugly head which is a shame, but it rarely affects the gameplay.

A lack of filters for online games also means that guys like me who like to use in-car views (and DiRT’s head cam “virtual cockpit” is superb) have to race against chase cam girlies who never get their vision affected by obstructive scenery, broken windscreens or flapping hoods/bonnets. It’s not a huge problem but some way of levelling the playing field would have been cool.