The game adopts an improved version of the Madness engine, which was the basis for the Need for Speed: Shift titles. Project CARS portrays racing events spanning multiple days, progressing from shakedown and qualifying runs to the race itself, while changes in weather and lighting conditions are simulated dynamically. In order to differentiate the game from the established industry leaders, Gran Turismo and Forza Motorsport, Slightly Mad Studios' aim is a ' sandbox' approach that allows the player to choose between a variety of different motorsports paths and grants immediate access to all included tracks and vehicles. Project CARS is intended to represent a realistic driving simulation. In addition to real world racing circuits and fictional kart circuits, there are two fictional point-to-point roads inspired by Côte d'Azur and California Pacific Coast. For licensing reasons, some tracks are codenamed using their geographic location. There are 74 drivable cars, over 30 unique locations with at least 110 different courses, of which 23 are real, with the remainder being fictional.

It was released in May 2015 for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. Project CARS is a motorsport racing simulator video game developed by Slightly Mad Studios and published and distributed by Bandai Namco Entertainment.