FlatOut 4: Total Insanity

Seeing the reviews you would be forgiven for thinking this will not be a fun ride but I'm happy to say this definitely is.
Flatout 4 does have similarities to Flatout Ultimate Carnage (such a great arcade racer) and while this isn't F.U.C. 2017 it still retains enough of the Flatout flavour many arcade racers, including myself, enjoy.
Career mode, stunts, quick race and multiplayer are all here. Career mode has 3 different competition levels and classes of vehicles to unlock. Racing earns credits to purchase unlockables so plenty to keep you playing.
The vehicles handle pretty well and are fun to drive with only minor annoying moments which mainly revolve around the cars tending to slide on their sides a bit much which also points to the vehicles not being as weighty as in F.,U.C. This lack of weight is a bit of a step back from F.U.C but the racing is still fun but it's something to mention
Game performance is great.
Plays silky smooth in 4k using my GSYNC TV with VSYNC off on a 2080Ti.
Visuals are surprisingly good too. Game really presents very well.
Sounds are decent and serviceable. Not audiophile levels but ok. Music is similar to F.U.C's rock tracks which suit the gameplay. I think that if the audio quality/sound sampling was better it would further elevate the immersion.
Special mention about the nitro which is great both in how it performs and sounds. Nitro'ing out of a corner is both satisfying and a useful gameplay tactic to earn an advantage when you would otherwise crash.
The sense of speed is very well done and employing the nitro has that risk/reward factor which is good.
Track design is solid and visually appealing.Their are multiple choices of which path to choose on most tracks which helps keep it interesting.
AI is good and I can't see any rubberbanding/cheating. If you race clean and fast you will win well ahead which I like.
A new gameplay feature in some races is the addition of weapons (!!) and they are fuuuuun :)
This isn't Forza
This isn't Wreckfest
This is Flatout and it's good :)
An easy recommend.

5.5/10

A bit mediocre, but still somehow enjoyable game, despite it's serious flaws. Without these flaws, I would probably rate it 7/10. But devs never fixed these flaws.

Worse than FlatOut 1, 2, Ultimate Carnage as well as it's clones; Wreckfest and Trail Out, but better than terrible FlatOut 3.

Additional info: this game was NOT made by original creators of FlatOut 1/2/UC/Wreckfest.

Pros:
+ Core features of the previous FlatOut titles are still there (racing, stunts, deatmatch, multiplayer; servers are still there but very few people play this game).
+ It's a FlatOut game (unlike FlatOut 3), just a bit unfinished and partially broken
+ Game can be enjoyable at least for a few hours. After that, you will probably get annoyed at physics related bugs and repetetive tracks
+ Nice graphics (except for character models)
+ Good soundtrack
+ Steam achievements
+ Good for it's price on sale (dont' spend more than ~5$-10$ on it; it's not worth it).
+ no mictotransactions of any kind

Mixed:
- Mediocre driving system. Worse than in the classics.
- Relatively small amount of cars. Less than in 2/UC, more than 1.

Cons
- Partially broken physics. Physics was a core of every FlatOut game and main reason to play. Small stone on the ground can sometimes makes you fly. Small wooden fence? Enjoy the skies. Most stunts are RNG due to wonky physics and input delay. Ridiculous and annoying. Why they never fixed it? Game flopped financially and was quickly abandoned.
- Car damage system is worse than in FlatOut 1/2/UC. Let's remember that these old games were made in PS2 era between 2004-2008 and FlatOut 4 in 2017...
- Repetetive and small amount of tracks. Feels like we have maybe 5 and they get constantly repeated, just with small changes. In late game, 2 more will be unlocked. Why not earlier? Bad game design. Most people will get tired of it in Derby stage (early game).
- Lot's of grind to unlock all cars. Not joking. I spend ~30hrs in the game and unlocked less than half of them.
- Unlike F1/F2/UC or even 3, you are unable to change your driver in career mode. Why? Other drivers are already there and you can use them in custom games. Story reasons? Makes no sense since there is no story or background behind protagonist at all and in fact, one of the rival drivers looks exactly the same. Evil twin?
- Bad optimization. Good luck trying to get stable 60 FPS even on modern hardware and especially on a 2017 hardware (when this game was released). Locking it to 30 FPS helps, but who wants to play dynamic racing game in 30 FPS?

So yes, I recommend this game, but barely. And only on a huge sale. This game can give you some hours of fun, but also frustration. If you don't have patience for mediocre racing games, just play FlatOut Ultimate Carnage (remaster of already good FlatOut 2). I'm a fan of the FlatOut series and really wanted to try this game. Had some fun and had some frustration, so I think that 5.5/10 score makes some sense. A shame that we can't write "Mixed" (yellow) reviews on Steam.

Mixed review for this game. Much better sequel than the abortion that came before it. But for every positive is a little negative.
Graphics are good but pop in is noticeable and anti aliasing is either poor or doesn't work.
Physics are a bit janky they work fine when in heavier vehicles but in anything else a small piece of debris can send you barrel rolling 50 foot in the air. Which is also annoying because to fill the nitro meter you need to destroy parts of the scenery so you are going to be hitting things.
AI is a bit all over the shop I can't tell if it's rubber banding or adaptive difficulty. They will either constantly fly up behind you and pit you or you can be miles ahead with no one in site,
Music is decent but I prefer the Flatout 2 OST to this but some decent bands.

Long and short not as good as Flatout 1/2 but is a decent game.

Well its a racing game alright, its just not FlatOut. Instead of dynamic crash physics, somewhat realistic driving and competative ai we got cars that emulate what it feels like driving bumber carts on ice and butter with ai sharing a combined 0,2 braincells.
I am only giving it a possitive review because of how funny the physics are.

Believe 60 mins of your gameplay can give you more fun than completion of all recently relased Need for Speeds combined with all their season passes.
No pinky-winky music, only rock-n-roll and metal what is awesome!
No weetsy-meetsy skins and colours, only a pure harsh metalic paints for cars.
Nothing seems to be undestructible
Tires flying everywhere, road is buring pale
Destruction like with frostbite's games
Join the derby in the pit mate
Only costs few bucks on a fucking Christmas sale!
Hell yea!

Just played for the first time and the destructive physics are quite impressive. If you're a guy you can kick yourself in the nads a few times to simulate the driving physics. NGL, had to rage-quit but to the games credit, didn't delete or refund. Next time I try am not going to expect a typical racing game where you try to win but instead a destructive playground with cars. Hopefully will have a better time then.

this game is fun ngl there is alot to do also can play online