Has enough variety between events and cars to keep things interesting, vehicles really do feel different from each other and your vehicle choice becomes a decisive factor in whether you'll get platinum or not. The cities look very nice, the driving model is on point and the kudos system makes taking each turn a lot of fun.
Only downsides imo are how some races feel unbalanced, particularly when both superbikes and supercars are in the mix, and there not being enough tracks. I also wish the tracks had day/night options and that you could change your vehicle within an arcade challenge instead of exiting to the main menu.
Also the bikes are so much fun to ride, wish more racing games had bikes.

There's so much to love here, just looking at it as some closed circuit arcade racer might sound boring but that is just the surface, there's a lot to see here. Game design that is simple but elegant yet detailed enough to transmit a lot of sensations to the player.
That bold vibration on gear change along with brief exhaust flames, the geometrically simple interior but with just enough camera motion to make it feel scary when you're going very fast, the little sound effect when you're earning kudos, the speedometer UI changing depending on the car, the animations of the bike riders interacting with the cars and the crowd and I could go on and on.

Beautiful game, one of the best racers of the 7th gen, absolutely in love with it.