Here’s the problem with reviewing Le Mans Ultimate: do you review it as a game or as a simulator? If you review it as a game, it looks like a slightly underwhelming package. Review it as a simulator, though, and it’s something very different altogether.
First, a bit of background. While PC [11,313 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/platforms/pc/”>PC.
There’s a few reasons for this. Firstly, it feels phenomenal to drive. The degree of communication via the handling model about how the car is behaving on the track surface is second to none, built as it is on the foundation of the excellent rFactor 2 simulator.
It’s perhaps most evident not when you’re getting things right, but when you’re getting them wrong; accidentally entering a corner with a touch too much speed and feeling the rear end of the car begin to overtake the front as you loop it into a spin feels utterly authentic. Painful as it might be to your racing driver ego, you know a simulator is accurate when, in that scenario, you only have yourself to blame.
The other reason Le Mans Ultimate has been embraced so wholeheartedly is Le Mans itself. If you’re unfamiliar with the real-world event, it’s a 24 hour ‘endurance’ race where teams of three drivers compete through day and night, handing over the car at pit stops. In recent years, the Le Mans 24 Hours and the World Endurance Championship that surrounds it has enjoyed an influx of manufacturers building truly stunning racing machinery.
The Ferrari 499P, for example, may well be the prettiest contemporary racing car on the planet. Cadillac competes with a more muscular silhouette that houses a thunderous V8 engine. Peugeot meanwhile has a unique concept that originally raced without a rear wing at all. And the 1.0 version of Le Mans Ultimate brings with it the race-fettled version of the Aston Martin Valkyrie with its screaming V12, reminiscent of 90s F1 machinery.
Then there’s an entire field of different GT3 cars – a race within a race – competing for their own honours in a specification of GT car that has long been a favourite of online sim racers.
This digital garage is made up of the sorts of cars sim players naturally gravitate towards, whether it’s because they’re achingly desirable or comfortingly familiar, and the inclusion in Le Mans Ultimate of three season’s worth of laser-scanned tracks from the World Endurance Championship means there’s plenty of locations on which to test their skills.
The focus on endurance motorsport too makes this sim a natural home for team-based online endurance events. Popularised by the subscription-only iRacing service, the best way to describe these scheduled multiplayer events is a bit like simracing’s equivalent of a Gran Turismo 7 [144 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/games/gran-turismo-series/gran-turismo-7/”>Gran Turismo 7.
And if you are truly committed to only ever playing offline, Le Mans Ultimate is hoping that the internalised feeling of mastery that comes from running fast laps or competing in single races to improve your speed will be all the continuity you’ll need for the moment. Le Mans Ultimate: not necessarily a great game, but a genuinely exceptional sim.
