i enjoy racing games, though i haven't really bothered to play them too enthusiastically. never really got into gran turismo, but spent around 40-80 hours on forza 2, quickly dropped forza 3 (more of the same), haven't bothered with 4, and watched 10 minutes or so of 5.

the dirt series, however, is really exciting to me. i love the concept of rally and gymkhana, and i love the physics of the dirt games. recently bought dirt 3 on steam and have been playing it more than anything (last few games i've spent any time on have been baldur's gate: enhanced, and not really much else, haven't touched ql in at least 2 weeks). i'm to the point where i've reduced my hud to speed, position, timer. the only assist i have is ABS. i'm using the 'complex' copilot/navigator info. it's a really fun way to get an experience of racing a car without all the time spent training to be trusted enough to drive an expensive rally vehicle down dangerous roads, and without the worry about dying for going balls out to see what is possible.

i'm curious, are there any games similar to dirt 3, but with a track editor, vehicle editor, gametype editor, etc.? sort of like a quake series for racing games? i would love dirt 3 to infinity if i could choose something like free drive on a track, or customize the number of AI opponents, or set my own time limits for drift courses.

also, are there any other modern games, or 'classic' games available on steam worth trying?

sort of tangent: back in the snes type days, unlocking characters was awesome and fun because it felt special. mortal kombat comes to mind as a major influence in the unlock direction, with easter eggs like toasty and reptile, and characters like smoke. anymore, 'unlocking' has just become a monotonous grind device to artificially inflate play times. to me, this is just a burden preventing me from doing what i want to do in the game.