Amazing graphics and realism aside, this game is somehow worse than the sum of its parts.
Ok, first things first, yes the game looks, sounds and, most importantly, feels absolutely amazing. But every single review has said that well enough already, so I'll move on. Suffice it to say, this is one of the best looking games ever made.
Probably the best thing about this game for me is just the feel of the thing. This must be why the series is considered to be the best in its class, the whole thing feels like it was made by people with such a passion for cars. Every bit of the game creates this wonderful little world, a world of nothing but appreciation and absolute love of cars and everything automotive. So that part of the game I adore, but obviously you can't just sit and enjoy the atmosphere for hours on end, there has to be an actual "game" part of the game, and that's where it really falls down.
So the main part of the game is made up of events, in tiers C, B, A and S. Tiers C and B are fairly easy, the cars are pretty tame and in almost every race you start half-way through the grid. So to get a podium finish (which is required to clear the event, which is required to progress through the tiers) you only have to fight your way through a small number of the opposition. But when you get to the last two tiers it really falls apart. Because in tiers A and S you ALWAYS start in very last place in every race, with 15 other drivers. So to get to the podium you have to overtake a very large number of other drivers in a very limited number of laps. And to make it worse, there are only rolling starts, so the cars start quite far apart.
You may say that overtaking so many opponents is a test of true skill, but for me it totally ruins the feel of the game. I thought that race driving was about setting consistent lap times, gradually working on getting past your opponents, being patient, looking for gaps, holding your position. But instead you're having to get the best car possible so that you can just about scramble your way past 13 opponents to get on the podium in just a few laps of quite a challenging course. I'm really hoping there is a qualifying mode in the full game, or anything that means you're not always starting from the back of the pack.
So the events feel like a bit of an afterthought. What else is there to do? Well, that's the problem, there really isn't much else at all. If you're quite a competitive racer who enjoys working on reducing lap times and generally being the best, fastest racer, I'm sure you'll get a kick out of the online mode and the time trial mode, which lets you set a time with a car on one of the courses. But for me they don't really cut it. You also can't enjoy the selection of cars in the game that well either; the only way you can drive a car is to buy it - you can't test drive them - and even in a quick race you can only use a car you already own. The problem is that the events don't give you much money so the only way of getting a good amount of nice cars is to just redo the events over and over, and from the last 2 paragraphs I'm sure you'll be aware of why that's not exactly a plus-point.
Despite all this, I'm sure that the full game will deliver what I'm hoping for. A larger selection of better-made events, a qualifying mode of some sorts, modes where you're not even racing cars, just enjoying their beauty: all of these things will, I'm sure, be in the full game. So long as that "feel" that I was talking about at the start - that feeling that the makers of the game really are just as passionate about cars as me - so long as that is in it, I'm quite certain it will be the best racing game, maybe even the best game, ever made.