Mito Gaming on a Budget Which (Older) Games Let You Drive a Mito Without Leaving Home?

MiTo Gaming on a Budget Which (older) games let you drive a MiTo without leaving home?

I appreciate not everyone is into gaming. I for one am certainly not, and it’s even been some years since my kids were. But I can certainly make an exception if it involves a MiTo. So this is a short guide for those who might have their kids’ games console in the house or a PC that might work to simply and cheaply have a go at racing or just bimbling around in a MiTo from the comfort of your own home. This is not a definitive gaming guide, and the focus is on budget: driving a virtual MiTo for hardly any money. Let’s start with some imme- diate fun: if you have an Apple Forza Motorsport 3 phone or an Android phone you Pic. 4.6. Re-fit new rear springs/pads into place can download GT Racing 2: The Assetto Corsa (which has some Real Car Experience right now cracking Alfa Romeos including for free. You have to complete the new Giulia, the 4c, 155 and a first race then you can get the 33 Stradale). yourself a MiTo. Complete a If you have a PC with a half- few more races and you’ll be decent graphics card (probably able to paint the MiTo and up- not a standard desktop with built grade it. It’s not hugely difficult -in graphics - that won’t be smart or tremendous fun, but it kills a enough to make the lovely bit of time and you can do graphics work) then you can get some screenshots just for fun. Need for Speed: Most Wanted, Assetto Corsa and others. Of course, if you have a later GT Racing 2: The Real Car Experience XBOX ONE or PS4 then there are some much more modern racing for a while I can make some rea- in-app purchases for the lazy who games available (such as the sonable progress, but all I want to want to get in a Ferrari quicker. more recent Forza Motorsports) do is take screenshots and modify The advantage for us is that the but they do not have a MiTo in! my MiTo. Honestly the gameplay MiTo is cheap and is available Sometimes, old is good (as I keep is something I may have to do to nice and early without all the telling my wife). get more rewards so I can cus- hard work for the more expensive Truth be told, I’m rubbish at tomise my MiTo. cars. gaming. If I really concentrate However, for the purposes of The gameplay is good with this article, I will give my very several modes for controlling the quick, amateur summary of the car (using finger touch or using (mostly older) games available the built-in gyroscope of modern that feature a MiTo, and there is smartphones which measures the a summary table with them all orientation). There is a great listed for ease later. range of tracks and cars with one- Broadly speaking, if you have off challenges and duels. GT Racing 2: The Real Car an old XBOX 360 knocking The ‘freemium’ aspect does Experience around in your loft, you can get get a little annoying after a while; on eBay or down to your local The beauty of this game is that some adverts between races, the used game shop and buy some- you can download it today on constant demands to buy addi- thing like Forza Motorsport 3 or your iOS or Android phone or tional features and so on. But 4, Test Drive Unlimited 2 or tablet. It is classed as a you can see past that and just Driver San Francisco and imme- ‘freemium’ game, meaning it is mess about with a MiTo in a diately be racing around in a free to play (and you can progress game that features good MiTo. If you have an old PS3 with hours of racing to earn cash graphics, good gameplay and you can get GranTurismo 6 and to upgrade to better cars) but has nicely rendered cars and tracks.

Forza Motorsport 3 / 4 to upgrade your MiTo, Forza has Forza Motorsport is one of the a host of upgrades you can apply classic, really good racing simula- along with stickers and liveries tions out there. It was devel- you can buy. oped by Microsoft to compete Forza takes place over many against Sony’s Gran Turismo, so seasons as you progress your from the outset the aim was to career, so if you want to take it make it more accessible and seriously you can have literally more enjoyable than the compe- hour after hour of genuine MiTo tition. competition. My only slight niggle with For- za is that there are broadly three AI settings of easy, medium and Test Drive Unlimited 2 hard. After a while, you will have mastered medium, but hard is very hard for the amateur. more life-like and the brakes fired from a carwash but magical- The difference between Forza locking up with ABS turned off ly get employed as a chauffeur, 3 and Forza 4 are, basically, two feels more like real-life (though but instead of being paid in cash years development. Forza 4 please don’t do that in real-life). you get entered into the Solar looks even better, using a new (at Forza 3 includes the MiTo, Crown, a race across Ibiza. Forza has literally hundreds of the time) image-based lighting Brera, 8C and a 1965 Giulia, with Okay, fair enough, you have to cars to choose from, so if you model, making every scene ap- Forza 4 adding a Spider, Montre- kill time while the game loads, like racing games (not just with a pear more life-like and, frankly, al, 155 and GTV6. Both games but this is all just a bit rubbish. MiTo) then Forza is a great place wonderful. have an Abarth 131 and 500 Es- Once you’re racing, it does get to start, but only on XBOX 360. The cars in Forza 4 are ren- seesse but only the earlier Forza better, but driving your MiTo on a Not all cars are available at dered even more beautifully and 3 has a Punto Evo. Both have a Mediterranean island does lose the beginning, but try to hunt a lot of effort was made to im- Lancia Delta and a Stratos, with it’s appeal after a while because down Forza Motorsport 3 Ulti- prove the sounds too. And Forza 4 adding an 037, and both there is no real skill involved. mate Collection, which has 500 they’ve used that to incredible have pretty much every Ferrari You control the car like a little cars and tracks enabled from the effect on a much larger range of you can imagine. radio-controlled car rather than outset. over 500 cars from 80 manufac- But Forza Motorsport 5 and feeling anything like you do on Forza has a wide variety of turers. The choice is overwhelm- other later Forza editions (e.g. something like Forza. different settings for each car, so ing. And fun. And still includes Horizon) dropped the MiTo in That said, the scenery is nice complete beginners can switch the MiTo. favour of the Giulietta, so you and you can definitely have some on auto-braking and use a handy have to find the older 3 or 4 ver- fun. You can customise the car re-wind feature if you make an sions to play in your favourite and interact with people on the epic mistake. But if you want to MiTo. island, helping people for cash go pro, you can finally turn off and generally levelling-up in cate- Test Drive Unlimited 2 (TDU2) traction control on the MiTo! gories of Social, Discovery, Collec- The cars in Forza are rendered TDU2 is one of those games tion or Competition. in incredible detail, along with where the concept could have And you can drive to really car damage - so if you plan to been really cool, but in practice random places only to find al- crash your MiTo on Forza expect The car handling on the the it’s just a bit annoying. most nothing there - I’ve lost it to look a mess afterwards. track is improved in Forza 4, so Set on Ibiza and Hawaii (not count of the times I decided to go And for those of you who like grip feels better, cornering is sure why), you start life being and explore only to find… nothing

iOS Android XBOX 360 XBOX ONE PS3 PC GT Racing 2: The Real Car Experience Yes Yes Forza Motorsport 3 Yes Forza Motorsport 4 Yes Test Drive Unlimited 2 Yes Yes Yes Driver San Francisco Yes Yes Yes Need For Speed Most Wanted Yes Yes Yes GranTurismo 6 Yes Assetto Corsa Yes Yes Yes

whatsoever. Need For Speed: Most Wanted TDU2 is not a bad game. No game with a MiTo in is bad. But it’s one of those games that you just mess about in. It certainly kills time and it can be different every time, but it’s not an exciting game as such. But I bought TDU2 on eBay for £2 for the XBOX 360, so in terms of value these days it’s definitely up there for a bit of MiTo gaming. Driver San Francisco Driver San Francisco is the strangest of all the games fea- turing the MiTo, and is certainly one that you'll either love or ly driving cars, getting out of cars, But if you want San Francisco And Need For Speed: Most absolutely hate. But like so getting into other cars etc. The scenery, some cool street racing, Wanted certainly is those things, many older games, if you can comatose John Tanner has an nicePic. MiTo4.6. Re screenshots-fit new rear and springs/pads some allowing into place you to explore the fic- get it for a fiver then you might ability called ‘Shifting’, basically crazy crashes then you’ll quite tional world of Fairhaven freely, as well give it a go! enabling you to ‘shift’ from one enjoy DSF. It includes the MiTo, albeit with a smaller choice of As a non-gamer, there’s person to another, so you can be Giulietta, 159, Spider Duetto, 8C cars than others listed here nothing I dislike more than rac- racing down a San Francisco and Giulia TZ2 along with (though you do get the MiTo and ing games trying to have a story street in your MiTo, ‘shift’ into a Abarths, Aston Martin and lots of the 4C along with lots of Lambor- -line or a back-story of the truck driver’s head to crash his American cars (and fire engines!). ghini, a Delta Integrale and plenty characters, and DSF has those. truck, then ‘shift’ back and cause of German cars). However, once you get into it chaos on your merry journey. NFS has a combination of chas- it’s not terrible, but you do This does take some getting es and challenges in which you need to spend the time to get used to, particularly for terrifical- can gain Speed Points to move into it. ly old people like me. But you higher up the leaderboard, but in In summary, you play an can also ‘shift’ out of a body en- truth the beauty of NFS is the undercover cop named John tirely and fly up to see all of San level of detail in the cars and the Tanner and at the beginning of Francisco to get a sense of surroundings. From a gameplay the game a guy you put in pris- things. perspective it’s pretty good when on, Jericho, breaks out of jail Putting aside the magical, co- driving your MiTo fast though you and puts you in a coma. Then matose ‘shifting’ and several oth- can frequently get chased by an like all bad movies, everything er random anomalies of the unfeasibly large number of police that happens thereafter is all in game, racing around the streets cars. Changing cars is easy (you your head. of San Francisco is actually pretty just drive up to something you I know, sounds terrible. But good fun, albeit the AI of the car like and swap), and the world of the advantage of this is that is a bit random and nowhere Fairhaven really does have some from a gameplay perspective, near as good as something like dramatic scenery with fantastic you are not limited to physical- Forza. But expect some crazy game- attention to detail. play, some surreal elements and There are ‘ambush’ events in fairly basic operation of the MiTo. which the police are heavily in- Worth it for under a fiver though. volved and outright races (from a rolling start, adding to the thrill) Need for Speed: Most Wanted but you can also just bimble NFS is what is called a around Fairhaven in your MiTo ’sandbox’ game. My under- and take in the sights. standing of this is that it is a You can certainly kill a lot of beautifully crafted, high quality time in Need for Speed and the game with minimal limitations on screenshot options are far- the environment, enabling the reaching, but it’s not really a player to pretty much do what game if you want pure racing they want and go where they like adrenalin. But it runs fine on my within the virtual world created Driver San Francisco relatively old PC with a reasona- for them. ble graphics card, so it’s a good

Copyright © 2019 Alfa Romeo Owners Club | MiTo Register www.mitoregister.com MiTo Gaming on a Budget Which (older) games let you drive a MiTo without leaving home? option to switch to when work works on this game. On familiar Assetto Corsa reaches a level a tedium that I tracks like Silverstone you feel just need a half-hour break in a the gradients and cambers, you MiTo without going out in the can feel the weight distribution cold. of the car, the shock absorbers working, the steering responsive- Gran Turismo 6 ness, the tiny changes that hap- If racing simulation is your pen when you touch the brake or thing, there are few better than the accelerator. GT6 really is the Sony’s Gran Turismo range, with best racing simulator of its era GT6 including the MiTo along and works really well for the Mi- with the 147, 147 GTA, 155, 156, To. But get it wrong and you’ll 166, 8C, Brera, GT, GTV and Giu- feel the physics as you crash, and lias from the 60s along with there is no amateur rewind on Abarths (500 and Grande Punto), GT6 to try again. play. selection of cars you can’t get on Lancia Deltas and Stratos, Ferra- But most enjoyable are the The issue I have with Assetto other games and the actual driv- ris and virtually every other car graphics of the game. The MiTo Corsa is the limited tracks and ing is nice. They’ve certainly you think of. and most other cars are beauti- the AI. Where AI works well, done the Italian tracks nicely and fully rendered and the tracks and your opponents are racing hard, overall it’s a nice racing simula- lighting effects are incredibly life- they are conscious of you as you tion. Perhaps you’ll get on better like, and with so many cars to are of them. But Assetto Corsa’s with it. choose from you can quickly AI seems to fill the track with Assetto Corsa is still available waste a weekend on Gran Turis- imbeciles who don’t care that today online on your PC, but mo. you exist. That coupled with how you’ll need a good modern If you have a PS3, then Gran graphics card. Turismo 6 is by far the most en- Summary GT6 is renown for its fantastic gaging game with a MiTo, and the array of tracks such as Silver- replays look incredibly realistic. I’ve been working on this arti- stone, Brands Hatch, Suzuka, Gran Turismo Sport also has a cle for some time - I just never Daytona, Monaco and the Nür- MiTo but is only on PS4. quite finished it. And it doesn’t burgring and Goodwood along- feel finished now - I could go into Assetto Corsa side the incredible fictional so much more detail and give tracks invented just for the game I’m quite a fan of Assetto Cor- much better reviews if I were an (many of which far exceed actual sa and I like the driving dynamics actual gamer. tracks in terms of thrills). a lot. It has an Italian flair, so But I’m not a gamer. I just like When Sony launched GT6 driving a MiTo, Giulietta, a 155, easy it is to accumulate penalties messing about with MiTo stuff, they used all the latest PS3 tech- 4C and a host of Abarth 595s and and I can be frequently frustrated and if there’s a MiTo in a game nology and built an entirely new every Ferrari including racing cars playing Assetto Corsa. then I’ll give it a go. ‘handling model’ which really makes for an enjoyable game- That being said, there is a nice The emphasis of this has al- ways been about gaming on a budget. And I really can’t empha- size this enough. If you don’t have a games console or a PC with a decent graphics card, go on Gumtree or eBay or ask around and you’ll find a used XBOX 360 for £30, then buy Forza Motorsport for a fiver and have a bit of fun. If you have an old Sony PS3 lying around gathering dust, get it out and find Gran Tur- ismo 6 for a tenner and enjoy some time behind the wheel of a MiTo at Silverstone. No modern racing games have the MiTo any longer, which is a shame. But while we still can, let’s enjoy some bargain-price indoor MiTo driving while its cold Gran Turismo 6 and miserable outside.