1. Is fuel load adjustable?
Bizarrely this was one of the most popular questions about the game. Unfortunately fuel load is not adjustable as part of the car setup menu prior to qualification or the race. When you pit in the game there are options to repair, change fuel, change tyres or change fuel and tyres, which suggest that in longer races fuel will come into play. Tyre and brake wear is an advanced option that is turned off by default, incidentally.
2. Is it worth playing the game with the steering wheel?
Yes, though the pad works extremely well too. The default wheel setup is great, but there are a load of control options that allow you to tweak dead zones, saturation and the like. Serious racers can tune the way the wheel operates to a frightening degree. You can make the same changes to the pad too, but the default setup is smooth and perfectly useable.
3. Is terminal damage possible?
While we weren't able to ruin the car to the point where the game hauled us out of the race, it's possible to smash it up so it's almost completely undriveable, but if you do manage to limp back to the pits you can get it patched up. It's also possible to overheat the engine until it fails, but with the default setup it took us a fair few minutes wheelspinning on the grass to lunch the motor.
4. Is there an in detail replay mode?
There is the option to save a replay after every session you drive, including career mode tryouts and multiplayer races. You can then access these replays on a track by track basis in the replay theatre. The fidelity is good but not perfect, but you have the option of following any car on the track, flicking through camera angles and removing the HUD. There's no telemetry or photo mode, though.
5. Is there DLC on the way, and will it include the Nurburgring Nordschleife?
As I understand it the first DLC will arrive around a month after the game's release. At a preview event last year, Atari revealed that there are several DLC packs planned including muscle cars, the Spa Francorchamps circuit and Formula Master cars. This was six months ago, though, so these plans may change depending on how well the game sells and whether the game's development overrun has affected DLC development. As far as we understand, the Nurburgring is unlikely to make an appearance in its 14 mile configuration in this version of Race Pro, but the team recognises how keen on it people are and will no doubt be looking at including it in future Race games.
6. Do I need to unlock cars in career mode before I can use them online?
Unfortunately you will need to unlock many of the car classes before you can use them online. There is a tiered career mode and finishing contracts in cars unlocks that car for use. The good news is it's not long until you begin unlocking the GT cars, and you can perform tryouts to establish your favourite car before you go to the effort of unlocking it. Minis, WTCC, WTCC 87 and, bizarrely, a single F3000 are unlocked at the beginning. All tracks can be raced from the outset.
7. Is the AI worth racing against, and can you add it to multiplayer races?
Obviously the AI isn't as good as human players to race against, but it certainly puts up a good fight. On the Very Hard setting if you run wide they'll stick their nose in and occasionally you'll get turned around when battling hard with an AI racer. They also put moves on each other and occasionally screw it up. You can add AI to fill the empty slots in a multiplayer race and specify the difficulty.
8. Does the WTCC championship follow the two race format?
No, when playing the WTCC championship you only drive one race, but the calendar is accurate to the 2007 season that is simulated. You have the option of a qualifying session but practise sessions only occur online. There is also a maximum of 16 cars in all races. You can choose to run all races in dry or wet conditions, but strangely enough not a random selection of the two.
9. Are short track configurations in the game?
No, only the default full length circuits are available.
10. What's the structure of Xbox Live play?
Multiplayer races start with a practice session to allow players to join the room. The host chooses to advance the session to qualifying, which allows everyone to post a single qualifying lap. A single race then follows, with the grid determined by the qualifying laps. There are leaderboards for fastest lap on every circuit in every class of car and these include laps posted in 'offline' modes.
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