Other new feature, and this one more than welcome: The weather. As incredible as it may seem, we had to wait for 6 years to get the weather conditions any Rally game should have right from the start. The ever nice weather isn't your only companion anymore on the road since now rain, ice and snow are there. And of course the effect isn't just pretty, it also drastically changes the behavior of the cars. Add to this the return of the night events, and I'll let you imagine the result. A landrush event on ice in the dark is some of the best (or worse?) chaos I ever got to experience in a racing game yet.
Last point, and without a doubt the most important one for racing fans: The gameplay. Codemasters keeps tweaking the behavior of the cars with each new game, with this time a focus on the weight of the car, and how it changes the way you drift around corners. The cars feel much heavier than before, and will go into oversteer much easier than before: The back of the car will tend to go to the outside of the corner faster than the inside if the entry speed is too fast. So the first few minutes will be a bit disconcerting for previous DiRT players, with lots of crashes or at least huge loss of speed. But in the end it's all for the best, as it makes the game feel a bit more realistic, and it also helps with the Gymkhana.