Great action, control, and fantastic presentation with option to race Le Mans at the end of every season!
I really like the way the race selection is setup in GRID World, the license points system, and the achievements are particularly well thought out in my opinion. I love the Le Mans option at the end of each "season". While drifting is included in the game its not my thing in general, but the game design lets you work around it if you choose.
The graphics are some of the best, with great replays and damage depiction. One area the game could learn from Gran Turismo 5 Prolog is to have the replay cameras be dynamic based on the action. In GRID the "TV" replay cameras are set for each part of the track (even the "in car" cuts), where in GT5P the replay cameras vary depending on what's happening at that point (i.e. is there someone close on your tail, are you chasing someone down, etc.). That said, the replays in GRID are very entertaining especially when you've incurred (or caused) damage and if you want to see how you were taking the line you can always manually select one of the fixed "play" camera views.
Control is overall very good (the demo might have you think otherwise, don't worry it's very playable) and I've used both the regular controller and the Xbox Racing Wheel and both are great (and much better options than the PS3 standard or dual shock controllers – I played the demo on my PS3 and all it did was reinforce how much I dislike the overall design of the PS2/PS3 controller).
The "rumble" is a little lacking on the 360 controller, but I never expect much from that anyway. I was a bit disappointed at the "effects" using the 360 Racing Wheel; while road feel, collisions and damage are transmitted well, subtle things like driving over rumble strips/curbing don't invoke much of anything (unlike games like Need for Speed on the PC using a Logitech pro wheel, which accurately fed back effects like cobblestone roads). Still, the overall force-feedback is good and does enhance the game play.
While I wish there were more "real" tracks from the States (there are a lot of made up "street" courses), the representations of the tracks that are included (mainly from Europe like Spa) are fantastic. And I don't miss the "story" mode at all! With its slick presentation and blistering action, GRID is a blast and a great addition to any race fan's collection.