Reviews of NASCAR The Game 2013

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I was immensely excited for a NASCAR game to FINALLY come out for PC but I feel like this is just another big game publisher exploiting the fandom of "insert-sports-genre-here" for profit. NASCAR The Game 2013 feels very broken and unfinished. From jittering cars during caution laps, to the AI literally racing THROUGH THE INFIELD, game crashing everytime I try to pit and don't even get me started on the paint shop.... I was only able to dive into the game after spending HOURS with steam support trying to troubleshoot why my XBox 360 controller wouldn't work with the game; despite it's claims of having "Full Controller Support." I finally discovered that the device drivers of my keyboard were conflicting with my game controllers drivers and the only way to play the game was for me to disable my keyboard in the device manager. I would also like to add that prior to purchasing this game that my XBox 360 controller worked with many racing games including GRiD, Dirt 2, MotoGP 2013, TrackMania, every Need For Speed game that I own and many many more. It is only with NASCAR The Game 2013 that I have encountered all of these problems. I give this game a big fat "meh.." It needs work... badly. This game has so much potential but I would strongly suggest against buying this game. The graphics look great and the controls weren't to bad but the bugs and game crashes rendered the game completely unenjoyable for me. Maybe next years version will be a little more polished.

UPDATE: After a month of testing and work on a new patch the developers barely fixed the AI, didn't fix ANY bugs and created even more. They have proven to myself and many others that they are incapable of fixing the issues that exist with this game. I strongly urge interested buyers against buying this title.

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I still love Nascar Racing 2003 but the graphics are obviously 10 years old. So I figured I'd buy this and see how it was. It's ok. The graphics are much better but the rear-view mirror needs to have better graphic capability. All the cars in the rear view mirror look like Land Speeders from Star Wars.

But my largest bewilderment comes from the apparent lack of tire temperature readings for each tire (inner, middle, outer). The most important piece of information for a team to see what their race car is doing is by deciphering the tire temperatures. As of yet, I haven't found them... just little temp indicators in the HUD. Every other NASCAR racing game that I use (iRacing and NR2003) does it right: after a run and you return to the garage, you see the tire temperatures of each tire. I don't know how someone can set up a car properly without this basic information.

Now, I've only used the game for about two hours and maybe I'll get used to it. It just was a glaring omission right off the bat.

For those people who say it's too hard or unrealistic: I say they don't know how to drive a race car. I started out with the drivers on Championship ability and don't have a problem. And that's with me still trying to dial in my G27 Racing Wheel.

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Initially the game was very frustrating using a 360 controller. Really felt I needed a wheel to be bale to make the turns as I was completely unable to run a race without continually crashing or getting passed rapidly ending up in 43rd place. Even on easy and getting the pole only was no help as I would immediately get passed on the very first turn and the only thing that would stop this was a caution.

Playing with the assists finally got me to the point where I could at least run around 30th or so once the traffic cleared out, but a yellow would bunch everything back up and I would end up shuffled back to the rear again. A problem I noticed was that my car was simply not as fast as the other no matter how well I drove. I needed the upgrades but that took points that were coming very slowly due to the poor finishes.

That's when I had the "aha" moment. Using ArtMoney (search for it extremely easy to use with good PC knowledge), I gave myself 1,000,000 points, maxed out all the upgrades, and started winning certain races quite easily. I found that tracks where brakes are actually used a fair amount were easy to win (Both road courses, Bristol, Darlington, Martinsville, Dover, etc.) while the bigger tracks were still impossible to win, but could actually finish middle of the pack when using the "retry" multiple times if needed. You get two "free" retries per game, then they cost 20,000 pts. But with basically unlimited points, this is not an issue. I ran Bristol on medium and ended up finishing 3rd and could not catch the two cars in front of me and had to really block to stay in 3rd over the last couple of laps. That was quite fun.

I played thru a season and decided to skip the large tracks where your finish position is simulated. I think I probably had an average finish of 15-20th for the races I skipped, which was plenty to get me into the chase. I used the same strategy during the chase and did end up racing at Homestead. Finished 20th and won the title by 12 points.

Using help, the game is playable and can actually even be easy (for certain tracks) on easy mode.

Honest reviews on NASCAR The Game 2013

It's an arcade game rather than a racing simulator. Unfortunately, it's also the only recent NASCAR PC game available, so you don't really have any options if you want to play a stock car racing game. The AI crashes you constantly, which can get REALLY annoying, but also helpful once you realise that you can pick up 10+ places after a big smash by just jamming on the accelerator and smashing into the pack (which is what the stupid AI cars do anyway). The cars also deliberately drive in front of you as you approach a smash, so sometimes you can weave your way through. I have all damage turned off, as it would make the game just about unplayable with it on, I think.

Of course, if you don't turn off all flags and cautions, the race just restarts and it's only a pain in the ass (it still throws some flags even with it off).

You car is also REALLY slow for some reason, and you have to race about 10 laps to catch the others before you can get a decent field position. Every other car will zip past you at the start, regardless of your starting position, and unless you deliberately get out of the way, the AI will cause you (and only you) to spin out/get turned around and immediately put you into 43rd place (in most races). Be prepared to get frustrated and restart the game multiple times. I haven't updated it (2 updates out so far), but it crashes pretty regularly after the race (including some 1st places had to deliberately get 2nd or 3rd a couple of times) and when you try and restart races. On the up side, the game loads quite quickly (lol).

The car models are pretty crap, but they look okay. The "paint booth" is buggy, and didn't work for me. The customisation of the cars is alright, but pretty basic, and I haven't seen it really make much of a difference to the performance. You can adjust a bunch of settings (weight distribution, steering etc), but I don't bother much. The track graphics are pretty basic. They look okay, but it's not all that impressive graphically (at least by 2013's standards). Of course, the whole NASCAR vibe is impressive, and that's what the game relies on. Racing the different tracks is good (Talladega, Bristol, Daytona etc), but only because it reminds you of NASCAR, not because the game presents it well.

Given the massive overblown budgets of recent "AAA" games, NASCAR The Game 2013 actually does okay with average graphics. It does the job and you get to smash Danica Patrick off the track for intruding into a man's world (I joke, but you can wipe her car out go Danica!).

The physics are okay, and the cars seem to handle realistically, but I've only been able to play it well using a keyboard. Using my Logitech controller would be great IF the thumbsticks worked... but they don't. And the d-pad only worked some of the times (ie: the car would just drive straight into the wall on turns, regardless of what I was doing).

Once you get over these amateur and stupid game designs (if you can), the game is kind of fun. Once you realise that it's just an arcade car game and not a serious racing simulator, the game is kind of fun. As I said, it's the only NASCAR game available on PC, so what else are you going to do? Given the popularity of NASCAR, it would be great to see a really well developed stock car racing game as an actual simulator with 2013-level graphics, rather than this cheaply made game. Alas.

It's really only worth about $14.95 at most to be honest. $19.95 is a bit steep for such a weak game, but if you dig NASCAR, it might be worth it.

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Maybe it,s just me, but my Thrustmaster doesn't work that well in this game, and had to configure it in the middle of races.

Graphics are OK, maybe with another wheel it can be a great game.