Revolution? No. Evolution? No. Racing? Yes.
Yes, that's all. Unfortunately the developers decided to scrap plans to give players the ability to cover their cars in lots of multicoloured plastic bits and run from the police to the sound of god aweful hip hop. The additional content is therefore left looking a bit 'lightweight', but it's worth keeping in mind that this is not really a stand alone product. Rather, it's meant as more of an expansion pack, and is priced accordingly whether purchasing alone or in a bundle with Race07. They could have at least thrown in some high polygon grid girls to liven things up a bit, but the mere inclusion of cars such as the Aston Martin DBR9, Audi R8 (with extra GT variant) and the Koenigsegg CCX should be enough to please any fan of previous SimBin games, let alone the full Nurburgring 'Nordschleife' circuit, which has been painstakingly recreated by the developers to great effect. The circuit itself is notorious for both its monstrous length, difficulty, and the amount of driver's killed there as a result. In any configuration it's a very fast circuit which throws sharp corners, hairpins, chicanes and even 180 degree oval turns at you, right out of nowhere. Thankfully however, despite sporting a full damage model and crash physics, GTR-E lets you walk away from any scrapes at the end of the day.
Given the complexity of the controls, this is a good thing. Most people complain about SimBin games being 'too real', requiring a steering wheel to give the precision input required for controlling a (simulated) 500bhp race car. It is worth noting however that the series has come a long way since the original GTR, and now features input configurations designed for players on a keyboard, as well as offering a total axis control overload for those who like that sort of thing, all two of you, leaving a steering wheel merely 'recommended'. The same goes for the car setups as well. I played the German version of the original GTR; just getting out on the track was a problem. GTR Evolution combats this problem simply by being written in English, but also by sporting pretuned setups for the cars that are still capable of doing a decent lap.
One area GTR does lack in is graphics. The cars are as painstakingly recreated as the tracks, and are very high polygon. And don't get me wrong, the game is never 'ugly'. But Simbin seem to have taken the same utilitarian 'real' approach as in previous GTR games, and this is starting to wear thin. What the visuals lack is a real visual kick, a spark of beauty to make even the tyre walls look wonderful, as you subsequently hit them. But then again, they are German. The game at least supports full widescreen in 32bit colour, and given the system requirements, most systems should be able to still run on full anti-aliasing at these higher settings. On a set of Logitech G25's however, the game at least sounds excellent, with every pop of the exhaust and the crack of a broken twig on the circuit all well detailed.
One issue sure to rear its head though is the aforementioned lack of content. Being bundled with Race07, it's Race's content which makes up about 70% of the game. Which would be fine, if Honda Accords were more exciting. Which they're not. GTR-E certainly isn't trying to win the fanboys over with its accurate depictions of Porsches, Lamborghinis and Ferraris, because as far as I could tell, there are none. Also missing are some of the more interesting cars from GTR2 - the Maserati MC12, TVR t4400R or Nissan 350z. Perhaps it would have made more sense to package the game with GT Legends - I'd much prefer the Ford GT40 to a BMW 3 series.
All in all however, GTR-E will go some way to keeping current fans of the series happy. Not to discredit the game in anyway, but lets be honest - it's a love it or hate it affair from the start. I love it, largely because it doesn't pretend to be something that it's not (name aside). It's not caught up on a wave of trying to market itself as the next big thing, or trying to cash in on a current trend. It is what it is, a realistic simulation of racing that punishes mistakes and pushes the player's skills to the limit. It could have done with perhaps some extra content, relying to heavilly on Race07 to give the package some weight. But whilst starting to show a grey hair or two, SimBin's formula still provides the best bet for simulator junkies. It is therefore not a revolution of any sort, in fact I'd struggle to call it an evolution. But it's certainly racing.