We covered the release of the CMR2005 single player demo but a couple of days ago the multiplayer demo was made available as well. Ive just had a chance to give it a decent play and see how it weighs up with last years game. I think you could best describe CMR2005 as a tweaked version '04. Most of the tracks are not new and the general presentation of the game is clearly just modified from '04. That said the game already did look good, and the tracks do look a little better, as does the GUI. I never really liked the server browser for online play in '04. They have continued to keep it quite basic, even (unfortunatly) loosing the lobby chat feature. One nice feature is how you can join active games and watch a map showing their positions while you wait for them to finish. From what I have read of the career mode it sounds like a good step forward, as rather than just working through a season you have a career path which should make it more interesting. CMR2004 allowed you to play a season at various classes, 4x4 or rear wheel drive etc but never really made it any more interesting than the 'quick race' mode. It sounds like it might be more like TOCA now, not suprising considering both games come from Codemasters. I loved CMR2004 and I'm sure others that did will like the new version, however it seems hard to justify buying it if you had '04 and arnt a die-hard rally/driving game fan.

MP Demo: 3DGamers FileFront SP Demo: 3DGamers FileFront

Since I'm making a rather large post here anyway I'll go one step further and add a few CMR2005 review links for those that are interested;
rewiredmind.com, gamespot.com, ferrago.com, computerandvideogames.com, pcgameworld.com