Somewhere in between the complex and detailed world of Gran Turismo and the sometimes ridiculous arcade game known as Ridge Racer there is Project Gotham Racing. I’ll admit that I’ve never really gotten into the PGR’s of old. Sure, I’ve had a few cocktails and let my inebriated side take the reigns of a Lotus Elise at a buddy’s house a few times but I never really sat and played the game the way it was meant to be played. A brief idea of how my initial session with PGR 3 went would be as follows: 3AM on a Wednesday with an empty Jolt Cola at my side and just the right amount of Cheetos grease on my controller and my fiancée yelling at me from upstairs to come to bed. In other words, it was quite addicting.

I was definitely going into this game comparing it to Gran Turismo 4 and I have to say, at first, I was a little disappointed about the fact that you can’t upgrade cars, something that I forgot about in PGR 2. But two things stand out here: First, you are racing cars that do not need to be tuned up and, second, this is a pure racing game where Gran Turismo focuses more on the simulation aspect. As I played PGR 3, I realized that as a “racing game” this was done correctly. You want to constantly be on the track, racing some of the finest cars in the world, not spending 2 hours trying to sell cars and come up with enough money to be able compete in the next series.

To start off, you have a choice of some really nice cars and in about a half hour you can be driving some of the finest in the game. No need to start off with an '87 Toyota and play for 2 hours before you can buy another car. You then work through a number of championship series that can sometimes get monotonous as a result of the simple challenges that you have to perform. However it still makes for constant track action. The solo career is fun and I couldn’t stop playing and dominating on the bronze level. Which leads me to my next point, the best thing about this game is that no matter if you suck at video games or are the next Whiz Kid, this game accommodates your skill level. You have your choice during the championship series of competing for steel (novice), bronze (rookie), silver (pro), gold (veteran), or platinum (Elite). And as you go through the championship series, you can choose which you want to do. Gran Turismo gave you only one option and that was it. Your performance determined how good you were. If you did well you got a gold, if not you got bronze or nothing. Here you can actually race the way you want. If you want to race in a bronze race, the AI isn’t very good and you can do so. This avoids the later series which are extremely hard to crack in Gran Turismo because the AI is so much better than the average player. It took me no longer than 2 to 3 hrs to finish the game on bronze. (I’m working my way through gold now.)

The second best thing about this game is the multiplayer. Online play is great whether you are jumping into a random race or you decide to play the online career (which is a great idea). The best thing about multiplayer is human error, which isn’t present in the AI controlled opponents. It makes it easy to race your race, and let everyone else around you screw up. The game intertwines an online career as well as a points system to constantly keep you updated and ranked on the XBOX Live nation.

The controls are simple, graphics are great and Project Gotham Racing 3 is, so far, the closest game we’ve seen that looks“next gen”. Achievements are tough but worth the hard work, and all the bells and whistles make the game replayable forever. (ie. Race the clock, track builder with 100 million combinations, PGR TV etc.) There have been some complaints about only having 5 cities, but those 5 cities are more lifelike than anything I’ve ever seen. At any point in the game you could stop, take a picture and match it up to real life. If they had added another city, the game wouldn’t have come out for another year.

PGR 3 is definitely worth the buy. In debating between this and Need For Speed or Ridge Racer 6, you need not look any further. PGR 3 is fast-paced realism with amazing gravity and physics that would make Newton cream in his pants. If you want to spend four hours tuning up a car, stick with Gran Turismo or a few others out there. If all you want to do is race, then go with PGR 3. Your thumbs and your fiancée will hate you, but you'll love the “too good to be true” experience.