First of all, Ford Racing 2 is a great racing game, it was published in 2003 and remains up-to-date.
The bad news: it runs ONLY in Windows XP.
It dows not run in Windows Vista and it does not run in Windows 7.
There is no problem during installation (in Vista or 7), but when you load the program, after the splash screen the game closes and you see a warning in a little window:
[ ERROR: WMA:347: Failed to create the wma_source_filter ]
I searched for a solution in the Internet but the answers were inconclusives. No one really knows how to solve the problem, unless, of course, to install it in Windows XP).
The config is simple and efficient. At the first time you run the game, before the game loads, apprears a box where you can choose the Display resolution (supports up to 1920 x 1200 x 32 bit), language and Detail Level.
If you play GRID or DiRT2 you will see some similarity (keeping proportions of years separing both products). Both has replay in camera TV mode, you need to win races to uklock new cars in each category (Classics, Moderns, off-roads, concept).
There are many kinds of competitions: standard race, elimination, one-to-one, seconds out (where you have to pass through many hour-glass along the track to gain seconds and finish on time - something like DiRT2 Gate Crasher). You have 3 modes for each race to choose: easy, medium and hard.
The physics are pretty good, you can control the cars without problem (Wow, its a race game! good to play with a steering wheel, and better with a Force Feedback Steering wheel!) , there are beautiful landscapes, winter an autumn are well represented, you race during the day and night, there are decorating objects in movement on scenes, like a train, a plane, baloons, and others. (no humans)
Unlike the Codemasters game, there is no crowd, no liveries with brandmarks but you can choose the color of your car. There is no rewarded money to buy auto parts and upgrades too.
Into the game, the Options menu has many itens found only in great racing games. For example you can torn on or off many itens like: Traction Control, ABS, Gears (Automatic/Manual), Mirror, Map (Like a GPS, shows the track, rotating). Music Type: (House/Rock/Funk/All)
The game detected my MOMO Wheel with FFB and it is possible to remap buttons: Accelerate*, Brake*, Handbrake, Change View (only bumper or chase) Look Behind, Gear Up and Gear Down. You can calibrate axis* (Wheel, gas and brake pedals)
(*) About pedals configured to combined or separate axis, the game works perdect with both configs. Of course, you need to remap it in the Controls/Buttons menu.
I voted 4 star to Ford Racing 2 because its a complete racing game (remember, it was built in 2003) runs smooth in a common PC with XP (does not run on Vista or 7), easy to understand, not crashes nor freezes, supports Steering Wheel with FFB (some fake "racing" games don't support, like "blur" (I want my money back!!!) and Juiced2 just so mention two of them.
It is worth its price. List price in march/2011, was $14,99 and I paid $3,75 . Great offer due to Anniversary Sale of GAMERSGATE!
And it is DRM Free.
I enphatically recomend Ford Racing 2 !