Weather effects are present and while the sunsets are gorgeous the wet and rainy London streets are incredibly lame. The rain effects consist of streaks of water flying through the air like video-static and water has no effect on road conditions or your car's handling. The fog effects are pretty good and make some of the races much more challenging. Pedestrians are so poorly modeled it would be funny if it weren't so sad. The population of the cities are these blocky mannequins that hobble around like crippled zombies until you get close then they leap out of the way with amazing agility or stick to the walls as you drive down the sidewalk.
Sound effects are pretty bad.
While the authors claim to have realistic sounds I have to doubt their claims. While driving the San Francisco courses you are constantly being annoyed by some surfer-dude with an LA speech impediment talking smack. I'm sure they intentionally did this for humorous reasons, but it is nevertheless, extremely annoying. CD Music is available but it quickly becomes repetitive and boring as well. Some sounds are quite nice like the bell ringing in Big Ben as you drive through London or the unique sirens of the London cops.