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Project CARS looks frighteningly real, but will it be fun?

Petrol-heads and fans of driving games among our readers undoubtedly know that May the 8th is Project CARS Day, when the driving game arrives on PC, Xbox One and PlayStation 4.

There’s no question as to how good the game looks; all in-game footage I’ve seen so far suggests it’s going to be a looker, to the point where it could embarrass DriveClub and Forza with its superlative levels of detail in everything from the cars themselves to the tracks they will race on.

PC gamers are especially fortunate in that they can look forward to driving Silverstone, Monza and other high-profile tracks in resolutions of up to 12K, thanks to Project CARS’ support for up to three 4K monitors connected to a single system, which naturally ratchets up the game’s clarity and detail, but of course only if your hardware supports it.

Xbox One and PlayStation gamers can also expect decent graphics that run at the developer’s target of 60fps, but limited to 1080p.

Take a look at these videos captured with the PC version of the game; they appear as photo-real as I’ve seen a car game’s graphics looking, and that’s an astounding achievement by Slightly Mad Studios.

Be sure to crank them up to 1080p/60fps for the full effect.

The car-obsessed studio’s chief operating officer is South Africa’s very own Stephen Viljoen, a man who’s been involved in other realistic driving games like Need for Speed: Shift and the GTR series, and clearly everyone there has learned a thing or two about car game development over the years.

The question on my mind, however, is whether or not Project CARS is going to be fun to play. Sure, it looks good, but will the game’s realism be a help or hindrance to its potential popularity, given that driving at such real-life speeds requires genuine skill and concentration on the part of the driver?

Fortunately, there is much hope as Slight Mad Studios has worked closely with the gaming community to ensure Project CARS is the game that car-game gamers want. It’s been delayed from its original 2014 release so the developers can tweak and polish it properly, with community feedback, which bodes well for a positive reception.

Regardless of the answer to the question of fun, I think Project CARS will do well with the hardcore simulator crowd with their own virtual cockpits set up at home complete with force-feedback steering wheels and pedals, who want to feel like they’re driving a car for real when they game.

Whether that translates into sufficient sales to justify Slight Mad’s efforts remains to be seen, but I’m rooting for them.

Project CARS is out on the 8th of May for PC, Xbox One and PlayStation 4.

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