career mode

[joevenzon]

I was thinking a non-linear style mode similar to gran turismo but with more racing modes. For example, you'd have a main screen where you could go to your garage (for tuning or to get in a different car), go test drive, go do races, buy new cars, or buy new parts. Test driving would be free, and you could test drive on any of the tracks in addition to some simple tracks like parking lots. When you do races, you get a choice of autocross, grip, drift, and rally. You'd earn money based on how you place (no entry fee). At any time you can exit what you're doing and go do something else, so it's pretty free-form.

We could have "career realism" settings that would make the system more realistic (requiring fees for race entry, not allowing you to enter high profile events until you build up your rep, for example).

An expansion on this idea would be to also have some amount of stories that follow along as you progress.