He is partially right about the shadow... if you follow a car in chase view, you can see that the shadow becomes more transparent and more solid over certain patches of the track. It is never fully away, but it can be very "thin" and then five meters further it will be solid again. It does appear to relate to properties of the track material. Unless AC models sun occlusion but I've not seen this on any other tracks...
Also, it is pretty dark. At 14:00 the faces of the buildings are pretty much sunk into black...
Also, it is pretty dark. At 14:00 the faces of the buildings are pretty much sunk into black...