IGN: First of all, could you tell us about the decision to retain the McRae name for this game following his tragic death in 2007?


Gavin Raeburn: The decision was made jointly between Codemasters and the McRae family. His ventures into events such as the X-Games, Dakar Rally and the Race of Champions have inspired us to look at events covering the extremes of off-road motorsport. This is where we're taking the series with DiRT 2 and Colin will play a part in that. DiRT 2 will be a great tribute, and we'll be revealing more about this over the coming months.





IGN: Last time we saw the EGO engine in GRID it was looking pretty spectacular – how much room for improvement was there for its third outing in DiRT 2?


Gavin Raeburn: We made key improvements to the EGO engine during the GRID project which lifted the quality of the game to a level we were very happy with. The development team have learnt a lot from the development of GRID, and have strengthened massively in their ability to get the most out of the hardware, notably pushing SPU usage on PS3, improving multi-core performance on Xbox 360 and adding PC specific features and technology. In DiRT 2, we're building on these changes to the engine, adding more physical modelling of the environment, improving lighting and shadowing, and broadening the use of our streaming system to allow much higher texture detail. Overall these changes mean we are pushing the boundaries of what is possible with the hardware as much as possible, and we're confident in our ability to lift the quality bar again.





IGN: The career progression was an excellent part of GRID – will there be a similar mode in DiRT 2?


Gavin Raeburn: Absolutely, the single-player experience is a very important part of our games. For DiRT 2, we wanted to create a journey for the player which encapsulated the spirit of off-road racing – it's about travelling the world in your RV, hitting off-road festivals and building your rep as a driver. Along the way you'll build friendships with the stars of the off-road world – like Travis Pastrana and Ken Block – and these relationships help you move up the ladder. If you get on well with someone like Ken Block, he'll invite you to cooler events and even offer to team up with you from time to time.







IGN: Likewise, the rewind function in GRID worked brilliantly – is that something that's being integrated in DiRT 2?


Gavin Raeburn: We're proud of the replay technology we have within our engine, and you'll certainly see fully featured replays in DiRT 2. We're going to include an improved version of the Flashback feature that was developed for GRID too. I think everyone who played DiRT will have had an unfortunate incident with a tree or rock at some point!





IGN: The online features in the original DiRT felt a little compromised – is there going to be significant changes to the multiplayer for the sequel?
Gavin Raeburn: It's all new. You'll see competitive online racing in all race types, plus a progressive reward system and community features which we'll talk more about in coming months.





IGN: With so many disciplines of off-road motorsport included, how do you manage to produce a cohesive package?


Gavin Raeburn: We have to strike a balance. We don't want to restrict what the player can do by saying "car X can only drive on track Y", but on the other hand we don't want to break the believability of the game's career progression with mismatched opponents. In DiRT 2 we'll be going further, looking at game mechanics that transcend race disciplines and vehicles to provide that cohesion. We'll reveal more details in this area soon.





IGN: And being the huge F1 fans that we are, we've got to ask – how is work going with the F1 game, and when can we expect to see anything of it?

Gavin Raeburn: The F1 project is progressing well, although it will be a while before we start showing it. In the meantime, the F1 team have a blog on our community website with which you can stay up to date with developments.