What luxury car was promoted in 1997 with a freeware PC game made by Digital Illusions CE?
S40 Racing S40 Racing is a freeware game by Digital Illusions CE (DICE) and released in October 1997 for the PC. The game was made as a promotion for Volvo and their S40 and during the fall 1997 it was shown at all large car exhibitions. It only has one car and two tracks (one being the Nolby Hills racetrack). It is based on the same code as "Motorhead". The entire game was completed in less than 45 days. The game sold 16000 copies through Volvo dealers in Sweden.
1997 World Rally Championship The 1997 World Rally Championship was the 25th season of the FIA World Rally Championship. The season saw many changes in the championship. Most notably, Group A was partially replaced by the World Rally Car with manufacturers given the option which regulations to construct to. One inherent benefit to manufacturers by adopting WRC regulations was removing the need to mass-produce road-going versions of the cars that they competed with, under the previous rules for homologation. This meant that vehicles such as the Escort RS Cosworth and Subaru Impreza Turbo no longer had to be mass-produced for general sale in order to compete at World Championship level, and thus acting as a means of attracting increased competition and involvement by manufacturers. In the few years that follow, the Championship saw the added presence of WRC cars from companies such as Hyundai, Seat, Citroen, and Peugeot, who would all compete under WRC regulations without having to manufacture equivalent specialised road cars for public sale. Both Ford and Subaru switched to WRC in 1997, except Mitsubishi who stayed with Group A to maintain the links to their Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution road cars. Subaru's transition was much more gradual for similar reasons with the early Subaru Impreza WRCs still largely Group A in nature.