Exploring the mechanics of my game

My game will be an illegal street racer i need to look for a place that will include a lot of roads and i also want to go for a urban type of theme style and i also want to include a lot of skyscrapers in my game. I have chosen a part of 'LA' and especially this one part.

This is something i want my map/game to look like, skyscrapers in the middle of the 'town' and then around it would be some sort of tall flats with loads of windows in them.  like on the left top side of the circle around. I'm planning to make a make map decent size, cannot be exact as I'm not too sure about the scale of it but i want it to include loads of roads you can drive on.

This picture is an excellent example of how i would like my streets to like in my game, I have circled all the objects that i want to utilize in my game. I really like all those trees on the pavements as i feel they add a lot of personality and color to the streets. The bins on the pavement gave me an idea of putting them into my game onto the pavements however when the player/AI collides with them they will not be able to knock it off the road but will instead crash with it. As for the lamp posts i want to make them so when the player collides with them they get destroyed, not literally but they get pushed over and fall to the floor without slowing the car that hits it. Guaranteed its at a fast pace else you wont be able to knock it off and instead something similar will happen like when you collide with the bin. This is basically what i want my streets to look like but i want mine a bit smaller than those ones, 2 roads for each side would be perfect.

Since my game will be an open world game i obviously have to think of stuff that the player will come across during free ride so i thought of adding in cops. I feel like adding cops to the game will make the free roam a lot more interesting and challenging because if they see you driving at a high speed you will attract their attention, I'm thinking of also adding cops when you're in a race and get caught, after the race ends and you still have a wanted level the chase will persist until you lose the heat. (I might add a system that will have 5 levels and the higher the level is the harder it will be for the player to lose the chase).

I am also planning on adding cars driving around so the roads aren't empty and they will also work as obstacles.

The cars that the player will be able to use I haven't thought of as of yet and also deciding on how many cars there will be. I think that if you copy how a car looks but name in differently you wont get copyright striked, so I'm thinking of just recreating some of the popular cars that would be good for a racing game.

As for what time i want to set my game i have decided that i want to do both night and day, so a 24h period. I have previously done something sun related so i have  a little of knowledge about it but I'll mostly do loads of research to get it spot on.

The controls for my game will be 'WSAD' . I decided to choose those over the arrow keys because i feel like its more comfortable to use 'WSAD' and mouse for camera control, unless you of course choose to have your camera locked then you don't have to worry about it. On the other hand most people will actually prefer to use a controller while playing a racing game which i prefer myself. However if the game does get released and it gains interest from people some of them might not have a controller but that's not a problem, i could just release 2 versions of the game for keyboard control and controller. 

After you cross the finish line a picture of your car will be taken, it will display how fast you completed the race and how much money you have earned. After clicking the 'Enter' key it will allow you to continue free roam from where you finished the race. However after you cross the finish line not in 1st place the game will be paused, a screen showing the times of the race will be displayed and you will have an option whether you want to retry the race or exit to free roam.

The plot of my game will be to defeat multiple bosses across the whole game to become the best. You will also get a shot at getting their car. Complete enough races and you will get challenged by the boss. After completing the main story you will become the most notorious illegal racer in California. After that there wont be much else to do apart from just free roaming.

For the race types in my game i want to go with a variety. I was thinking about making circuit races, sprints and time trials. I feel like circuit races are a basic thing for every racing game and I'm sure every racing game i have played has had a circuit race in it. Sprints are another type of a race that's included in most of racing games I've played, it basically requires the player to get from point A to point B while racing against other players (AI). Time trials is another race type i want to include in my game, it requires you to get from A to B in the shortest  time possible (there will be a set amount of time you have to finish the trial in e.g. 47 seconds if you fail to complete the race in given time you will be able to continue it until the finish line to see what your time was however you will not be successful and will have to retry the race but since you already completed the track your time will be displayed below the time you have in order to be successful so you can see and compare how you're doing each time and whether you need to upgrade your ride or just path smarter for better results.