Very, very enjoyable stuff. I’m eight or nine hours in now. After six hours I crossed over into the second zone and was soon bouncing over sand dunes in a buggy, happy as anything. I’ve done races, I’ve done challenges and I’ve driven around in search of liveries and vista points… and I’ve just driven for the joy of driving. The handling model is great fun and the game looks ropey at times, but absolutely stunningly beautiful at others. Looking east at sunrise towards a forest fire, everything black and red… mindblowing.

Some events are better than others. The buggy events are always highlights, there’s a downhill bike race near the starting camp that’s just amazing, the monster truck events are fairly dull. But nothing’s broken, the structured “game” stuff varies between amazing and competent enough and the world is just awesome.

I know a lot of people online are laying into this left right and centre, but if you wasted hours and hours cruising round San Andreas listening to the country station, just for the love of driving through the countryside, this is the game for you. Just remember to supply your own country music – the 360′s support for iPods has come in very handy this weekend.