NEW YORK, April 13 — Honda’s luxury division has taken its most popular sedan and injected it with some genuinely emotive styling and sporting potential for the 2018 model year.

Like Toyota’s Lexus and to a lesser extent Nissan’s Infiniti, Honda’s Acura marque can sometimes be guilty of overlooking character in favor of ensuring premium reliability. However, with the new TLX which is making its debut at the 2017 New York Auto Show, the company finally has a sedan that looks like it came from the same studio that designed the Acura NSX supercar.

"We’ve really upped the ante in terms of styling, emotion and road presence, more effectively communicating the TLX’s dynamic capabilities,” said Jon Ikeda, Acura vice president and general manager.

Like all the previous Acuras, the new model will reset benchmarks in terms of creature comforts, cabin materials and driver focused technologies offered as standard.

For example, it comes with automatic emergency braking, lane keeping assist, adaptive cruise control and road departure mitigation systems, all standard as part of the AcuraWatch suite of technologies. It’s also available with an optional torque-vectoring all-wheel drive very similar to the system found on the NSX. Some models will also offer wireless charging and LED interior mood lighting.

In addition, the TLX comes with some serious stylistic personality. The company has made subtle but clear adjustments to the styling of each model variant — rectangular exhaust ports on the V6 TLX or 19-inch wheels and larger air intakes, and a unique front facia design for the sportiest A-Spec model. The A-Spec will further benefit from a much sharper, sporty suspension set-up, tighter power steering, sports seats with extra support for the front passengers and a sports steering wheel. — AFP-Relaxnews