Reviews
Or, Larry compares the budget trims against their expensive counterparts, and rules out a couple definite "no" cars.
Bins
Nobody 
Now, onto the reviews!
First up is @Ludvig with the 437SO as the high end, and the 425PO on the low.
Review
Right off the bat, Larry noticed the interesting front ends of these cars. The inverted widow’s peak is very visually distinct, something he likes. These cars both run boxer engines: a running theme with the vehicles he found today. In this instance, a 226ci six cylinder boxer.
The base model provided somewhat disappointing performance, coming in slower than this year’s Toyota Corolla. But, it’s not the worst thing ever; a Corolla can drive on the highway in relative peace. The SO offers a nice five-second race to sixty, and achieves this by essentially just tuning up the base model’s motor. Considering the price difference, that’s a solid improvement over the low model.
But Larry found that slightly disappointing; there wasn’t much difference between these cars, from a mechanical perspective. Slightly better handling on the SO was appreciated, though.
What he found really odd was that something about the PO made it slightly less reliable than the SO, though not very much; with a lot of the cars, this proved to be a pattern. The SO had a cool sporty interior though, and an automatic soft top, which Larry thought was pretty cool. He filed these away for further consideration.
After reading about the Swanson twins, Larry came up to the Phantom Striker GT and Luxe models, engineered by @Kevin980 as a daring rear-engine entry, one of only two.
Review
Of course, rear engine means cool! Not a lot of those left, really. Especially cool when Larry noted that the GT had a turbocharged V6 motor. It wasn’t as large as the one in the Swanson cars, but the car was much faster even without the turbo. These were true sports cars; substantially more expensive to own than the Swansons, but with the performance to back it up, especially as it was the most fun car to drive that Larry was looking at. Not to mention the better reliability; sure, parts were more, but these were the most reliable cars Larry was considering.
At least on the GT, which to Larry was a strong competitor.
The Luxe was really more of a cruiser, which made sense considering how much cheaper it was. Somewhat irritating was the detachable soft top on the thing; for a hard top, Larry could live with that, but he really didn’t think a rag was worth the effort. Especially considering the Luxe was for his wife; he’d have to do it for her every trip.
Then Larry read something spooky: apparently, these cars tended to begin to oversteer at just fifty miles per hour! Even worse, by 100 they were trying to overrotate. Enthusiasts suggested this was likely due to greatly excessive front camber for the rear engine; Larry wasn’t sure what that meant, but he did know that it wasn’t something he wanted to deal with.
Shame, because the Phantom Striker GT was a legitimately cool car. Automatic top, manual steering, adaptive dampers! It would have likely been the pair he went with, even accounting for the obscene service costs of the GT and barely-tolerable expense of owning the Luxe (though curiously, it was another case of the entry level option being less reliable). This one had to be a no.
Larry turned to a new page in his binder of magazine ads. His eyes went up when he remembered that @Ch_Flash had engineered the Yajirushi Maestra and its Turbo sister.
Review
Front wheel drive? Larry could only think of a few front wheel drive sports convertibles… ever. Sports car nerds would cry about it, but Larry liked the audacity.
And man, visually the Maestra Turbo was actually kind of a killer car, too. The styling was a little dated, but Larry wasn’t sure he liked the new wave, anyways. It flowed really nicely in a way not many cars got right, and the Turbo did a wonderful job of distinguishing itself from the regular version. To boot, both of these cars were really affordable, each coming in at the lowest price in its segment by a really wide margin.
These were also reliable cars, affordable to own and very safe. The top trim was only marginally more expensive than some of the “budget” options. The active suspension damping was a nice touch, a neat talking point.
But oh man, the regular version. It was slower than a Honda Odyssey… as in, the freaking minivan. Larry sighed. He could deal with a little slowness, but he really, really didn’t like the idea of being almost twice as fast as his wife’s car. He’d be perpetually chained to her, which this car was supposed to help him escape from time to time.
Final nail in the coffin: these were also the least sporty and least comfortable cars he looked at. It really was a shame; this was one of the best looking cars he was considering. It seemed like perhaps Yajirushi had made something for a different market, leaning too much into a lower cost.
Hoping to shake things up, Larry checked out what @04mmar had designed: the Nerrucci 370 Targa and the RS trim.
Review
Right off the bat: this guy got Larry. Whatever flaws the car may have had, it had spirit. It was weird down to its chassis, one of two with a glued aluminum frame. Larry figured this was an entry level supercar of some sort.
Even better, these two cars offered similar raw performance with very different driving feels. The RS was much sportier, with better handling, faster acceleration, and more road feel.
But was it really worth the extra cash? Yeah, Larry thought so. The base model was not slow, yet the RS was almost twice as fast.
Unfortunately, the 370 certainly was reported to have the reliability of a supercar. The decently sized boxer six driving it was a bit dubious, and overall the car was far from bulletproof. But it had a unique automatic hardtop, and a sport undertray, not a common pick at all! Sadly, the steel rims did not help its handling. Neither did the fact that it terminally oversteered; it seems both of the rear-engine cars Larry had decided to look at had the same issue.
The danger that provided meant Larry couldn’t consider the cars; but he did like them, and if he was buying for just himself, most likely would have still gone for something like this.
OOC
Been seeing you make submissions for a while now. This one is actually really good. You read the brief better than most of the contestants, and if it didn’t terminally oversteer, probably would have won.
In the suspension tab, you can adjust the camber; this has a very big impact on how the car handles, and your settings were the default ones.
Lastly, Larry had the work of @abg7 to check out: the LVC LRS8 and LRS6.
Review
Pretty cars! They looked a bit like an MX-5 to Larry, who generally wasn’t crazy about Japanese stuff- he preferred German and American. But even so, they had very nice proportions.
There was a lot of car to be had here. The budget trim was the most expensive one, but not by a whole lot, and it was by far the fastest and sportiest. It handled itself well, both trims the best of the lot in that regard to an extent that was hard for Larry to conceive- almost 1.2 Gs, on factory tires. And the LRS8 had even more to offer.
The V8. Oh man, the V8. DOHC. High tech aluminum silicon block. Forged internals. And pushing an even 400 brake horsepower… naturally aspirated.
A hidden automatic soft top. Glued aluminum chassis. Variable power steering. Magnesium wheels. Paired with an agile, easy to drive, fast car.
In terms of value, the LRS8 was actually cheaper than everything but the Yajirushi pair. As a result, the two cars were both very capable despite the wide price difference.
It seemed perfect… but then Larry’s heart broke. The LRS6 was the least reliable car on the list, meaning he’d be battling it constantly. It seemed like that performance came at a cost: it had many of the features of the LRS8, but without the same quality of parts. And the automatic transmission wasn’t trustworthy. He sighed, disappointed, but still figured he might be able to justify the car to himself.
Larry continued to debate between the manufacturers he had narrowed his choices down to for a while. Ultimately, he could only pick one.
Results
The Swansons provided the right mix of fun, fast, and dependable. While not the most unique or exciting of all the cars, they were still not boring- none of them were. The SO was quick, and the PO was easy to drive. Predictable handling, relative comfort, and good looks combined to make these a difficult, but well-made choice for Larry.
Man, did he like the LRS8, though.
Winner's Gallery
Scoring
- The Swanson cars, for providing ultimately the best mix of value, performance, sportiness, and uniqueness.
- The LRS twins. Man, the LRS8 is cool. Unique engine layout and plenty of other fun stuff.
- The Yajirushi cars. If Larry didn’t sweat performance as much as he does, or if the base model was just a bit faster, these would provide a really strong competition.
- The rear engine cars. While both were really cool, neither one had the correct suspension tune to make the cars less dangerous- which also absolutely destroyed their handling potential. Shame, because with the correct tune, either of these cars could have won.
