GRID: The Oversteer review

Let's face it: if you're really into motorsport or cars in general but not that great behind the wheel, gaming really is the next best thing.

So when Codemasters announced the latest, re-booted version of the long-running GRID was on the way, I knew I had to check it out.

GRID features 104 career events across a variety of championship classes including touring,  stock, tuner, GT, and invitationals and even an open wheel class presented by Fernando Alonso.

The game throws you straight into racing. When you begin, you start in a Cadillac C7.R racing at night on the streets of Shanghai. As soon as you finish that race you head to Indianapolis and go stock car racing, from there you head to a rainy Brands Hatch in a VW Golf TCR - showcasing the game's varied tracks, cars and conditions.

Once that over-the-top opening sequence is completed you are brought to the main menu where you have the option to begin your career, go custom racing, or head to multiplayer mode.

The aim of the career mode is to move through the different championships as you qualify for the Grid World Series final. You can select any of the different series to start your career in. As you progress you have requirements to finish one championship before you move onto the next as you head to the Grid World Series.

I started out in the invitational class racing classic Mini Coopers in Europe, this was a lot of fun. From there I headed to racing classic muscle cars on the streets of San Francisco.

There are 69 cars available in the game, below are a couple of my favourites spotted in the online garage include:

• Cadillac DPi-V.R
• Holden ZB Commodore Supercar
• Ferrari 330 P4
• SRT Viper GTS-R
• Porsche 935/78 Group 5 "Moby Dick"
• Ford GT GTE

The game has a great variety of Street and road courses around the globe, Australia's Sydney Motorsport Park even gets a mention.

The list of tracks are as follows:

A nice touch the game offers is the ability to drive different configurations of each track.

As an example, Aussies will be stoked to see the "Amaroo" version of Eastern Creek included.

Time attack is a large part of the game, with a variety of different tracks and cars on offer for the challenge. For fans of the World Time attack event in Sydney, you can buy and drive some of the fan favourite cars that have competed in the event.

• MCA Silvia S13 Hammerhead
• Audi R8 1:1
• Mighty Mouse Honda CRX
• Under Suzuki’s Nissan Silvia S15
• Fire Ando’s Mitsubishi Evo 

Some cool things I found in the game:

• When in career mode, you get automatically selected a GRID spot for each race, but you have the opportunity to do a run a single hot lap in order to move up the GRID.
•  The Nemesis feature, where you get to race mid pack with another racer you might have had fun passing and driving against, you then score more points if you beat him in the race.
•  When you are doing a hot lap to qualify for a race, if you exceed track limits you time is wiped and is not counted.
•  In a race, if you again exceed track limits or drive too wildly against your fellow racers then you will you be reported to the stewards and will face a penalty post race.
•  The sound for each car is fantastic and very realistic, the team behind the game have really nailed the engine and tyre sound.
• The AI for your other competitors is excellent and they are great to race against, they will fight hard for positions and will also get themselves into their own incidents from time to time. There is over 400 different drivers all with a variety of skill levels.
• The Invitational class has some of the coolest cars including classic Touring cars such as the Ford RS500 Turbo, Alfa Romeo 155 and Volvo 850.

There will be two versions of the game available. The 'Launch Edition' ($70 - features a special GRID edition Aston Martin) and the 'Ultimate Edition' ($130).

The Ultimate Edition lives up to its name by featuring a huge amount of extra content in typical "season pass" style.

This includes 90 extra career events (30 per post-launch DLC "season"), 12 new cars (four per season), five GRID Edition Carbon Liveries for certain vehicles (each with added XP boost), it also features cosmetic additions like player cards, banners, non "carbon" liveries and "VIP status".

GRID is available on Xbox One, PlayStation4 and PC from the 8th of October for the Ultimate Edition and the Launch Edition is available from the 11th of October.

Joel Strickland loves all things automotive, you can follow him on line @joelstrickphoto on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram