The Crew beta / the torture of my graphics card

[Dragawn]

Since there is no NDA I guess I can share some stuff with you guys, and because some of you were interested in it...
So completed first day with about 4 hours of gameplay I easily got to lvl 10 and thus finished whatever story they released so far. Which is, for a racing game, really well made with advanced cutscenes and characters talking, like youre used to in other ubisoft games like AC.

Anyways, first big turnoff for me: speed seems to be fps locked, atleast for single player and in closed beta (they seem to be planning to uncap the fps since fps change option is greyed out in menu). With that, my poor gt540m graphics got brutally tortured. I don't know if I should continue. I've been playing the game on lowest settings in lowest resolition, but the poor thing overheats in 45-75 minutes playtime. When I was trying out pvp as last thing this evening it started making worrysome slight crackling noises after 15 minutes (Errr, is this... normal?)

The handling of the cars, at first, they felt like boats on wheels, until I turned the reaction speed and sensitivity all the way up in the settings. After that the cars still took some getting used to, you can feel the weight shifting unlike some other games.

The world, well, it's astonishing in my opinion, the level of detail and the vastness is great, featuring some epic scenery. Often you'll find yourself in bland fields though, or surrounded by a forest. I'd call the scale slightly smaller than the map of ETS2, but it does have a lot of stuff in it.

The skill challenges are entertaining and haven't bored me so far, they don't give you a lot of cash, but they are a great way to get some good parts.

Well that's my experience so far,... Hopefully I didn't ruin my graphics card.

[EnryGT5]

My GT540M experience... i only used it's full potential for a few months maybe? Then it started brutally overheating (90-100) degrees Celsius with EVERYTHING and i just don't want to turn it on again, i don't even have a fire extinguisher next to me!

[Dragawn]

Well, I cleaned out my laptop once with an air compressor spray thing when it started overheating on everything like you said, which fixed it. Maybe I should again...

[UltimateBMWfan]

Finishing the download on The Crew right now, although it's been slow today as Deutsche Telekom has had a few problems. Fingers crossed it'll be downloaded soon and I can test it out, although I don't really have high hopes for this game in my opinion. It's not my style of game. The NFS style gameplay isn't what I'm looking for in a driving game.

[WizzyThaMan]

Since this topic was about The Crew, I figured I would post it here.

Today they have revealed an image explaining all the customization possibilities on cars in The Crew!
Check it out!

[Janekk]

I'm thinking about getting this. Did anyone take part in recent console beta? Opinions seem to be very split on this. Most complaints I've seen are "cars don't handle like in Forza" which isn't very helpful to me considering I never played it. I'm suspecting a lot of these people just don't like arcade driving model (that may or may not be good since I missed betas so I wouldn't know) and would want something more realistic. So how is it?

[Dragawn]

I'm thinking about getting this. Did anyone take part in recent console beta? Opinions seem to be very split on this. Most complaints I've seen are "cars don't handle like in Forza" which isn't very helpful to me considering I never played it. I'm suspecting a lot of these people just don't like arcade driving model (that may or may not be good since I missed betas so I wouldn't know) and would want something more realistic. So how is it?

They're constantly tweaking the physics trying to get the best out of them but here were my experiences from the last pc beta:
Its very far from NFS arcade handling, but it's definitely not simulation either. You can feel the weight of you car shifting, and you can spin out if you mess up. You can't do barrel rolls or anything though, the 3D physics aspect of the game engine are limited sadly enough. In my opinion it's realistic enough, no "oversteering is fastest" bullshit, and the cars have weight, maybe even too much from back when I tested although this can have been changed and each car has its own character (which you can't finetune sadly enough, so if you get the game, make sure to testdrive all cars before making your pick)
All in all, I don't think it's too bad at all despite its limited game engine.

[Janekk]

Thanks for answering, driving model seems like something I'd like actually. I never really minded arcade model like in NFS even though it was bit boring considering you we're flooring it through 90% of corners, not very involving. One more thing though I heard you can't rebind buttons on controller. Is that true? I find it hard to believe someone would do that after Rivals fiasco (or at all really). Then again it's Ubisoft.

[Dragawn]

I never tried to rebind them, I only played with a controller for a few hours during the beta, but people seem to complain about it yeah. You can adjust sensitivity and response though, I remember doing that.

They seem to listen to the community somewhat though. After months of nagging they have confirmed that they'll have text chat on release on pc, and if the demand is there they might add it to the consoles aswell.

One thing I forgot to mention which bugs me a bit is that if you'd just hit something at high speed, the game will "jump" the car so instead of hitting it you scrape against it. Which is a great feature for less skilled players or small accidents, but isn't realistic at all.