As you'd expect from a title, the handling is impeccable and unrivalled by any other title. Though you could argue that more modern racers like Project Gotham 2 and TOCA Race Driver 2 are more fun to play, neither have as solid or satisfying a feel about them. Like GT3 it still looks gorgeous, though undoubtedly in comparison to the titles just mentioned it loses a little of it's spark. The cars are just as solid and sharp as they were in GT3 and some of the background scenery is spectacular. The Grand Canyon in particular is still as impressive as in last year's build, though unfortunately foreground graphics haven't developed any further. spectators go some way to creating a realistic feel, but the truth is that the shiny blocky foreground buildings don't look nearly as impressive as they did when GT3 launched. The five courses included offer a lot of diversity to accommodate the varied lessons the school mode wishes to teach. The Italian Citta Di Aria course is especially fun; powering around the tight cobble-stoned street course is fantastic and feels significantly different to anything on offer in GT3. As previously mentioned, the Grand Canyon looks amazing, but the course design unfortunately fails to make a real impact.

The main thing to consider when deciding whether this game is for you is to ask yourself what you want. Prologue is very limited in that it offers a focused and somewhat unique challenge and whilst this may not be to everyone's taste you cannot deny that what it does do, it does brilliantly. No game is without fault, however, and Prologue is no exception. On the few occasions you do encounter opposing racers their AI is still as lame as it was in GT3. This is maybe not such a problem here due to the emphasis on learning, but it arouses a slight concern for the content of the fully-fledged GT4. The difficulty curve of the school challenges is a little erratic meaning that a mind-bendingly hard challenge can sometimes be followed by a significantly easier one, which can feel a little unsatisfying. More annoyingly, although the soundtrack is new for this version some of the GT3 jingles remain. Considering how I've already had to listen to them a million times, I don't especially want to do so again. There is also one bizarrely explained lesson concerning fuel economy that may well catch you out for a while. Without a clear explanation of what is required of you it becomes a matter of trial and error to pass the test. I admit that I had no idea what I was supposed to be doing and was shamefully forced to visit Gamefaqs to progress.

There is, of course, the matter of the lack of car damage. To call this a fault of the game would be a tad unfair as there's no rule stating that car damage necessarily leads to a better game, but seeing as the GT series prides itself on ultra-realism, the whole façade is somewhat shattered when you collide with a barrier at 200kph and emerge totally unscathed. The justification for this is that to maintain the concept of total realism, damage would also have to be totally realistic: something the team felt was unattainable on current hardware. As a substitution you are punished for heavy collisions with a 10 second period of reduced speed. This is annoying initially but in practice works surprisingly well, forcing you to race at your best. Also a problem is the old spectre of impenetrable ribbon barriers that rears its hideous head on the rally stage - I thought such horrors were forgotten in today's titles.

Prologue is short and it's limited. You can clock it over a weekend, though such is the skill required to attain gold in every test that many could not achieve this goal even if they played it for the rest of their lives. It will certainly not be to everyone's taste and many will likely choose to hang on for the full GT4 title (whenever that may emerge). But two things for me are undeniable: 1) that I'm far better at racing games now than I was before, and 2) that I haven't had so much fun with a for quite a while. If that sounds appealing to you, and seeing as you can pick up a copy for under £20 from many outlets, I think you could do far worse.

80%

By Ben Parfitt