I've had a ton of fun with it, in my opinion it's the best open world driving game I've played. It's like a driving MMO - you start off with a basic car and license, you can participate in single events for small sums of cash, or tournaments to win big money. Winning tournaments also unlocks more licenses you can obtain to drive faster and better cars. You will use your winnings to buy said cars, which you can upgrade/paint (somewhat limited), and also houses to store them in, or you can buy clothes for your avatar (all of the above can be enjoyed strictly single player), and since it's an open world you'll see people driving around every now and then, you can challenge them to races or start cop chases with them, but since it's an old game it's pretty rare.
You start out on the island of Ibiza, which is pretty big, and later you unlock Oahu (I think?) which is frickin' massive. One of the most enjoyable parts of the game was just cruising around all the roads with the sick new ride you just bought. The map will mark which roads have been traveled or not (I think there's an acheevo for 100% roads driven) so some days I'll just boot the game up, pick out a road I've never driven down before, and just cruise. Turn up the radio (the in-game techno station is actually pretty good, and the fake commercials are pretty hilarious, although it can get repetitive) and just drive. That's probably the best part of the game, is just cruising, without any destination or purpose, just get in your favorite car and drive.
The game is not a sim, nor an arcade racer; it sort of falls in between. I've heard a lot of complaints about the handling in the game but I didn't have any problems with it, just don't expect Gran Turismo type gameplay. Also if you're interested in the game definitely check out the
Unofficial Patch, it has a ton of bug fixes and also adds a bunch of cars.
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