Recent reviews by Purplegill10

TL;DR, If you can get past the dead multiplayer, lack of overall single player content, and a very strange racing mechanic compared to the rest of the series, then you will uncover what could be one of the biggest hidden gems of the 8th generation. If your desire for team racing hasn't been satisfied since NFS Carbon 15 years ago, this definitely proves its worth...as soon as you get used to the mechanics.


I got this as a gift from a friend after it went on a 90% off sale for 4 bucks. For that price alone it's at the very least worth a try; much less worth a game that's genuinely fantastic once you get past the rather big learning curve.

TSR is one of those games you really, really can't get the hang of within the first hour of playing. It's important not to treat this like a normal racer or compare it to the previous entry in the series (Transformed) because the team mechanics play such a gigantic part in how well you do in races.

This is a racing game where...
-Racing Lines should be avoided
-NOT using items plays a big role
-Simultaneously impossibly hard yet completely fair (more on that later...)
-The non-story GP/Single Races might be the best part of it

When I first got into TSR my instincts were either to play it like Mario Kart (focus on items and drifting) which failed, to play it like an sim-arcade racer (focus on lines and boosting) which also failed, then proceeded to get frustrated on just how you play something like this. What changed everything was when I used the look back button and saw the trail you leave if you're ahead of your teammates. Instead of focusing on my lines I decided to try and race in a way that made it easy for them to follow you and gain boost. This COMPLETELY changed the game and it finally clicked in my head on how you really use your teammates in-game. When you race in gentle lines and try to be as straight as possible on the straightaways it allows your teammates to catch up and either skimboost off of you or increase your team meter which allows for a full team boost once full. Also giving your items away instead of using them ALSO has a gigantic impact where not only do you boost your team gauge even more but you then give them even better items than what you could have had solo. Of course, this also goes the other way where if you request an item they can give you a more powerful version of what theirs was too! After that clicked in my mind, it lead me to believe that...

If you learn how to use the team mechanics in this game, suddenly it becomes one of the most fun racers I've ever played.

Suddenly once-impossible races on the easiest mode became extremely easy, and the expert mode which I swore was AI cheating and completely impossible before suddenly became a rush every time I would play. Using teammates leveled the playing field where it is VERY hard to beat the opponents but losing feels fair and winning feels like a grand achievement. If you use your teammates to get out ahead at the beginning, save your team boost until the end, and CONSTANTLY give items to your teammates who have fallen behind, then this game absolutely becomes one of the hardest yet most rewarding games I've ever played.

Of course, there are two massive downsides to this game as well.

Once you get past the mechanics, there's not a lot here. The music's FANTASTIC, the levels are neat, and the character/car designs are good, but other than that the two biggest problems with this game are its meager content level and completely dead multiplayer. This game is BEGGING for a fleshed-out team multiplayer career or at the very least a team mode of sorts but all you can do is queue up for races online with or without friends and that isn't even mentioning how there's almost no one playing at any time. My best recommendation is to find a discord for this game (some are in the steam discussions page) if you really want to play online but otherwise it's just lacking. That's why I said earlier that the most fun you can get out of this is playing the GP or single races in the single player since the raw mechanics underneath those negatives are still sublime.

There is a genuinely good game here despite all that. If it got marketed better and online didn't die off, then I don't doubt that people would largely consider Transformed to be the inferior of the two. Unfortunately the reality is that, just like with games before it like GRID 2 or NFS ProStreet, if you introduce a new mechanic that takes time to learn then most people won't take the time to do it out of frustration and in turn self-cannabises the very online community that would have saved this game. I really hope that one day this game picks back up or sumo digital could somehow revive it, but as it stands this will be one of the hidden gems that just couldn't make it.

TSR is a great game that has cult classic written all over it. I'm sure that 10 years in the future we'll look back on this fondly but as it stands it's a great single player experience without much else going for it. If I had to give a numerical rating, this is a solid 9/10 and what could have been a 10/10 given a great online community.

GRID 2019: The most fun tech demo I've ever played (and I genuinely mean that in the best possible way)


TL;DR, GRID 2019 is simultaneously the best and worst game in the series. If you just want to race tournaments in single player, don't care about customization or presentation, and love the original game's handling, then you will LOVE this entry. If you're looking for 2008's immersion and variety, GRID 2's fantastic multiplayer campaign, or Autosport's pure racing, then this game is completely skippable. If you don't feel like you fall cleanly into either camp, then read below...



I have never been so conflicted in my life when playing GRID 2019. On one hand, this game looks incredible and is an absolute BLAST to play with similar handling to the original GRID but updated to be even more fun than before. On the other hand, that's literally all the game has to offer with one of the most shallow single player experiences I've ever played, THE most shallow multiplayer experience I've ever played, and an overall feeling of just "wait, that's IT?" during my entire time with this game.

Grid 2 attempted to do something different with the series when they introduced their "TrueFeel" system which was, well, let's say an acquired taste. Autosport attempted to change the game into a full sim-arcade leaning more towards the true simulators like rfactor or iracing compared to something like Forza or Gran Turismo. Neither of those titles ever really attracted the same audience because they never really evolved from what made GRID 2008 such a unique racing game to begin with. It's almost like you could rename every entry in the series into its own game and no one would really notice. In fact, I'd argue that the GRID series was basically a name given to any tarmac-based games that were developed by Codemasters (that weren't F1) purely because the series never really had a concrete vision in mind. This game however, absolutely changed that as it finally felt like they were recreating the vision that the original 2008 game won so many racing fans over.

The ONE place where GRID 2019 absolutely excels is in the gameplay department. The driving is GRID 2008 except BETTER, the AI is possibly the best I've ever seen in a racing game, the graphics are gorgeous with possibly my favorite UI aesthetic in the entire series, and the game FINALLY has a car list that's worth celebrating as this was the one weak point with every previous game in the series. Every race feels action-packed, the difficulty is extremely fair and fun to play with at every setting, the car actually responds to your inputs and any mistakes you do never feel like it's the game's fault, and for once your teammates actually matter and can be competitive unlike previous entries. As I said before, if I was purely ranking this game for its gameplay alone then GRID could very well be one of the best, if not THE best, racing game of all time in my book. The small moments of pure racing is worth the sale price alone as I've never been happier racing what truly feels like a sequel to the legendary first game in the series. With that being said though...

If 70% of the game is the best game I've ever played, then the other 30% must be horrible for me to consider this game only barely worth playing. Unfortunately, GRID 2019 absolutely falls apart the second you leave the single game mode of racing behind. GRID 2008's fanbase still regard it as one of the best racers of all time because of how much immersion you felt outside of the races. You start from basically nothing and over time work your way up through the ranks, first only racing contracts before you start your own team, meeting new teammates, managing your team and cars, and all of that while continuing being guided and talked to by your business manager and crew chief. GRID 2008 was groundbreaking for giving that sense of immersion and progression that was sadly starved from the rest of the series and lead to disappointed fans with every entry. GRID 2019 tried to bring at least some of that back with a new teammate system and the ability to customize your cars again but it feels so hollow when the only interaction with your teammate is giving them orders through the same crew chief on every race and the only differences between them being how well they do in races. GRID 2008 had voice acting for every teammate, they would talk to you during races, they all had their own unique driving style, your business manager would make comments on whoever you chose (including hilariously referring to your first teammate as "Really? This guy?") so each teammate actually felt like a real person that would work with you in order to win. The best way I can describe it is that they felt like a real TEAMMATE rather than just an empty car with a different name tacked onto it. Of course, customizing your car also got slashed when the only thing you can change is the paint job and vinyl pattern compared to the extensive sponsor customization in the original. At the very least GRID 2, even with all its changes, still had an immersive garage that had its own aesthetic and you still felt as if you were in charge of your own team. GRID 2019 has none of that and feels like a small improvement compared to the barren wasteland that was GRID Autosport's garage system.

If you take the actual racing out of it, this game is nothing but menus, pictures, and a call of duty-esque playercard system that allows for at least some personality when looking over your garage. To be brutally honest it feels almost like a demo for a game that's been hacked to allow access to everything in the full game. That is why I genuinely mean it in the best way possible when I say...

Genuinely, the racing in this game alone is enough to warrant a thumbs up from me. This is the kind of racing I was forever wishing for in ANY game, much less a sequel/reboot to the original GRID, and it delivers it in spectacular fashion. When you look at anything else the game has to offer then it just falls flat in almost every conceivable category. What hurts the most about saying this is that this game could be the base of something truly special if Codemasters was able to justify the budget/time to just build up everything outside of the racing and graphics. If they could justify hiring tons of voice actors, completely revamping everything about the central campaign, add in tons of new modes like GRIDs 2008 and 2 had, expand on the ownership aspect that 2008 had, bring back the truly spectacular multiplayer campaign of GRID 2, and wrap all of that up in an immersive package that the original game was known for, then I would be fully willing to believe that whatever comes next could very well be one of the greatest, if not THE greatest, racing games of all time. Instead what we're left with is a case of what could have been and what feels like an exquisite frame for a painting that doesn't exist.

Truth be told, I love GRID 2019 for what it is. In a vacuum it's a fun, if shallow racer that is a great example of what an arcade-sim can be.

Knowing what this series is capable of though? It's a heartbreaking, painful, and deeply disappointing title that has so much potential that probably won't ever be full realized due to the terrible sales figures this game was able to bring in.


If this is how the series ends, then I want to genuinely thank Codemasters for the 13 year ride, but in the back of my mind I'll only be able to see this series as the series of what could have been, and not of what it was.


Please, if anyone at Codemasters is reading this, please push to give this game the sequel it deserves. There's too much potential here to be forgotten.