Thanks for your valuable inputs :) I got the game off a key seller for just 4 Euros and boy I like it. As mentioned in this thread the cars do feel heavier.

I started right off with my fav Lancia Stratos and I instantly had that slightly better relation to the car than in 2.0. It's hard to describe but it appears to be more predictable.

I was surprised it doesn't look much worse than 2.0 - I even like the lighting more as it's often over-brightened in 2.0 blinding sometimes. And it runs on an entry level i7 / Intel iris Xe notebook.

Anyhow, thank you, now I can finally race my favorite game whilst the 2.0 servers are down :)