After confirming that the Dirt franchise is being split in two in order to appeal to both sides of the racing-game fence, the fine folks at Codemasters are back at it again. Dirt 5 has been announced for an October 2020 release on consoles and Steam, along with a 2021 release on Google Stadia.
Like its Dirt 4 predecessor, Dirt 5 will combine simplified rallying/rallycross with a wide variety of other off-road activities. The racing surfaces will include dirt, snow, ice, mud, and gravel among others, and every event will feature dynamic weather. The truck/buggy racing known as Landrush returns as well. No racing game would be complete without a campaign mode, and this new installment has exactly that, even including voice-lines from Troy Baker and Nolan North among others.
Personally, I hope we also get to see rally-raids, Trailblazer, Head 2 Head, and the party games we’ve seen in previous Dirt games (Showdown included). But if they’re absent, there’s nothing preventing us from booting up the older titles to play those modes.
While this new iteration is not intended to be in the same category as Rally 2.0, I have faith that Codemasters will launch another super-fun racer in Dirt 5.
