Boxster and Cayman on top of Car & Driver's 10Best Cars list
 

Just got my January 2014 Car & Driver, and the Boxster and Cayman are described as "Best of the Best" for C&D's annual 10 Best Cars issue. A quote:

They really rave about how wonderful both cars are... definitely worth a read!!!

Here's a link: http://www.caranddriver.com/features/2014-10best-cars-feature-2014-porsche-boxster-cayman-page-7

I love it!

Even though I'm not personally a big fan of the redesign, I love to see the Boxster continue it's 16 year tradition of glowing press.

I sat in the 981 and could not believe how bulky it is. Inside and out it has really grown over the years.

^ I had the same impression. It's getting girthier than what narrow 986/987 roadster feels like.
I park my car every day in an average sized parking space, the car parked next to me often backs into his space so I pivot the car's angle so that the other guy has more room to open the driver's side door. When I step away to look at the Boxster I'm always reminded at how narrow the car is relative to a mid-sized sedan. The pivot angle easily allows me to put about a 1.5-2.0' of distance to the next car. And of course its not a very long car either as I can easily keep 1/4 of the parking space open so that I'm not door to door to with cars next to me.

At any rate, I guess the Porsche engineers have figured out that improving performance requires a wider plant-- with the benefit of improving ride quality, that's certainly the case with the 991 Carrera. But it's still too long to equal the Boxster/Cayman handling. And probably why there's no need for things like the 991 GT3's four wheel steering in order to give it more neutral and less weird/abrupt directional changes typical of the swollen in size water-cooled Carreras.

Porsche got the 981's right. I'm still on the fence about the styling though. Those doors have not grown on me a bit.