TOCA Touring Car Championship

TOCA Touring Car Championship is a Racing Game based on the Real-Life Championship in Britain.
Back in the old days when I was only about 6, I can clearly remembering this being the one game other than V-Rally and ISS Pro being one of my firm favourites. I remember this having, in my young opinion, having outstanding graphics. For someone my age in around 1997-1999 I found the game difficult, understandably as this had some of the most realistic physics at the time. Eventually, once all this had been overcome, I finally started progressing in the Championship (which is incredibly difficult considering you have to get 20 points to progress each circuit).

There was a reason why I could never stop playing this game, it’s just so fun. Yes, the AI was a bit aggressive, but then so was I (remember playing your first racing game when you were young, trying to take out the opposition, this was the feeling) and it had damage! Car pieces flew off the chassis and I loved it, I never won, but I loved causing the biggest accident off the M1. After this period of "instead-of-racing-I-shall-do-everything-possible-to-destroy-the-opposition", I finally grasped how to control the car, and what a feeling! This game gives so much satisfaction once you've done your best lap round a Heavy Rain Brands Hatch. The tracks also have been brilliantly recreated by the geniuses at Codemasters. A good example, again, is Brands Hatch, all the bumps and angles of the old circuit, and Silverstone with its world known bending start line.
This is a real challenge for hardcore racers, forget Gran Turismo, if your in the lead and think you have a margin away from that annoying Renault, to suddenly find your Audi jerk forward and slide off into the distance, you have been hit by the AI. This is what this game is good at, providing the challenge that playing multiplayer would have, an aggressive opponent. All the sounds work well, they are all upbeat, making the racing quicker and certainly adding the slight tension which could make or break that last corner at Donnington with the Vauxhall firing another last ditch attack. Racing fans should also rejoice, the commentary isn't annoying yet distracting (all respect to Murray Walker, but the words "All he has to do is complete this lap" with Schumacher on the prowl in Monaco, to go and ditch the McLaren in the wall...). This game is awesome, and still is, racing fans, get strapped into your Peugeot, on the Back Row, heaving with rain, because your about to go through one of the best racing games ever made.