I love how many developers are around here...
Just because games have weather and night/day cycles, does not mean the game changes the car and asphalt specifications to match it like in the real world.
It is easy to show day and night... It is a much different story making a car simulator respond properly day/night and weather conditions in a real world way.
Games are still a trade-off of processing... Do you put the processing into tire physics or weather physics? Do you display extreme detail on a car or the entire environment?
Turn 10 focuses their processing on the car and not as much on the environment... Other games choose to focus on other things like day/night and weather... That's what makes each game unique from each other. And that is good for all gamers.
A perfect example is Minecraft... The processing of the game is more focused on its grandeur and creativity rather than focusing on managing pixels in the environment.







