Choosing the top racing games for PC is a difficult challenge. So many factors contribute: the genre isn’t only about graphical fidelity and spine-chilling sound design, but it’s also about immersing you in the action, as if you are in the driver’s seat, eyes strained as even the asphalt whips past at 240kph. A good racing game feels natural, whether you are perfecting your timing for a flawless gear shift or blasting out the back end for a spectacular drift.
“How could you neglect Grand Prix Legends?” don’t ask. “Where has Geoff Crammond gone?” We will be among the first in line to play those games again if they resurface on Steam or GOG and discover that they haven’t matured as well as we had thought. But if you want to spend your Everygame online casino winnings on something, now you’re in luck. For those of you who just want to jump in and crank up the engine of a fantastic racer, whether it’s a complex simulation or an arcade adventure, we have got some frantic PC racers for you.
So let’s take a look at the best racing games of 2023 for PC…
Forza Horizon 5
The latest open-world arcade game from Playground Games departs from the British Isles and heads to Mexico. The landscape in Forza Horizon 5 is 50% larger than the one in Horizon 4, and it’s filled with vast desert highways, tiny Mexican towns, and magnificent canyons. Taking advantage of the previous games’ amazing seasonal variations that bring the world to life, storms can whip up violent winds at any time in Horizon 5.
Except for the new weather, not much has changed, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing because Playground Games has completely perfected the racing game concept. Traditional races, co-op campaigns, stunt jumps, seasonal championships, and persistence tests can be completed in a variety of fast and attractive vehicles varying from modified dune buggies and pick-up trucks to one-off hypercars.
There’s plenty of material to keep you getting back; when the in-game environment changes every week, new events surface alongside them to accomplish, earning you replaceable points that can be redeemed for exclusive cars.
Dirt Rally 2
Dirty Rally 2.0 is probably not the racing game for you if you don’t know your pacenotes from your driveshaft. Try Dirt 4 instead if you are hoping for a casual driving experience, merely going from A to B a little faster than you would ordinarily be able to on your regular commute. Your co-driver will fire commands, numbers, and directions at you hard and fast in Rally 2.0, and if you can’t handle the different terrains and hairpin curves, you’ll be bashing into a bush before you know it.
As you will see in our Dirt Rally 2.0 PC evaluation, it is unrepentant in its hardcore instincts. Unlike in more recreational racing games, failure is common, and even little mistakes are harshly punished. Heavy crashes assault the senses, as if a flashbang had detonated on your bonnet. If you are stuck behind the pack, the arrival of surface deterioration will make even traveling in a straight line difficult. However, if you know what you are doing, there are few finer representations of this difficult discipline among the greatest PC games than Dirt Rally 2.0.
Shift 2
Shift 2 may be the greatest game on this list in terms of balancing realism and accessibility. It’s not simply how the car handles – threatening but capable – but how it consistently considers what players require to achieve a high level of performance. Shift 2 offers a dynamic perspective that adjusts gently based on context, rather than locking your vision and staring out the hood or asking you to pay for TrackIR to swivel your head.
The consideration applies even to the depth of field. This is an overused visual effect, but Shift 2 uses it to draw your attention to where it should be. When someone is closing up quickly on you, items further away become fuzzier, but your mirrors focus in razor clarity. As you navigate through congested traffic, your cockpit blurs as the automobiles around you sharpen. It may appear gimmicky, yet the experience is as genuine as driving a car in everyday life. Shift 2 is devoted to conveying the thrill and accomplishment of high-performance driving, and it does so excellently.
Project Cars 2
You may have observed that when you blend steering and acceleration inputs, real cars rarely cartwheel into the median. In fact, they are pretty adept at rounding corners – it’s almost as if an engineer considered the issue during the design process. While race cars in Project Cars 2 are more likely to bite back, they are also more adept at turning. When you drive a Ferrari or a Lamborghini around a circuit, you will most likely spend more time having a great time than worrying about the lack of a reset button in real life.
They appear to be equally irritated by the driving sim genre’s proclivity to equate difficulty with the impression of driving on treadless wheels on a slab of melting ice positioned at a 45-degree slope. So, even though you give the accelerator some beans, cars can actually move around corners here. Don’t get us wrong: this is not a virtual Scalextric set; mistakes are still possible, and traction is nowhere near perfect. But, most importantly, you are not penalized for these errors by crashing into the closest trackside barrier.
Wreckfest
The goal of Wreckfest is usually to be the first to reach the finish line, although pure racing isn’t the only method to do so. Storming into your rivals to deplete their vehicle strength is a legitimate method of winning or you can attempt to outrun everyone else.
There are also elimination modes that demand you to be the final vehicle standing, as well as a large selection of vehicles to pick from. With an absolutely precise damage model and the option to pit school buses versus golf buggies and anything in between, gather your friends and head online to experience some of the funniest driving moments in a videogame.