The National Voices section features commentaries and reports on PGR 4 action throughout the world. The contributors have been chosen from the most active members of the PGR community and will provide a unique voice for current and upcoming events.

Soon, I’ll need to have thousands of words written and hundreds of photographs taken in order to a) leave university with some sense of achievement and employability, b) have some sense of well-being, and c) actually have something to show for all this “work” I’ve been doing. So I thought I’d spice up my life a bit by playing Project Gotham Racing 4 all week. Today, like most days, I want to talk about cars, in particular the following notion: “That Ferrari F430 is a bit slow.” It’s highly unlikely you’d hear such a comment pop up in any conversation, but in the world of PGR 4 this is now the harsh reality. The so-called performance “envelope” has been pushed so far with today’s Class A cars that even a general powerhouse like the F430 lurks in the shadows.

It’s really quite odd. PGR 3 brought us “Life begins at 170mph,” which started the ball rolling and ultimately distorted our views of a fast car. Back in the days of PGR’s first outing, my preliminary go with a 360 Modena felt like being strapped to a jet-powered trolley and let loose in a Sainsbury's (a grocery store). It was so good I waited until the house was empty, turned up the volume, and went berserk, pushing the high-strung V8 down empty New York streets. Look back to Metropolis Street Racer, where the big guns were a Nissan Skyline GT-R (R34) and a TVR Chimaera, and suddenly PGR 3 and 4 seem uncultured.

Is this progress? Are fancy licences now the obvious choice? The exotic selections of PGR 4 sure hold appeal, but I like an underdog, a humdrum vehicle that can embarrass cars of much greater value and extravagance. How would a Skyline fare today? It’d certainly be dwarfed by the Ultimate Aero TT, though the same likely would apply in real life. The fact still remains, though, that cars that you and I would call serious machinery suddenly don’t seem all that special once injected into PGR 4’s big, bad cities.

Is there a solution? Although PGR’s future is a bit cloudy at the moment, I do have a suggestion, and a topical one at that: Make PGR 5 “green”. You must have as successful a racing career as possible while emitting miniscule amounts of carbon dioxide. Suddenly a Škoda Fabia vRS and a Fiat Panda 100HP are fighting for top honours, as gas-guzzling F430s are no longer “a bit slow,” but most certainly “a bit dirty”. Who can do the fastest lap of the Nordschleife and return over 40MPG?

If you want the snow to keep falling on Quebec and stop those ice caps from swallowing up London, act now.

Comments? Sound off in the forums.