Among the very last physical games I bought from Best Buy before they began to phase out physical media along with PacMan World:Re Pac. This is a suped up port of the arcade game, and to its credit, it does add quite a bit more content. There are far more tracks and far more "vehicles" including a whole ass unicorn and tank. While it's still enjoyable on account of just how ridiculous and arcadey it is, something definitely gets lost on its trip to the living room. Part of the fun of this game, to me, was the cabinet itself. It's very loud, over the top and flashy- not necessarily something you can really emulate on a couch. The main disappointment, however, is the lack of online multiplayer. This kind of game feels made for that, but at least there's still couch co-op present.

When people say arcade racer this is the style I think of. Unlike today where most arcade racers are actually simcades Cruisin' series is full-on arcade madness.
You also have to give credit to Raw Thrills for trying to validate the 40$ price with adding extra courses (from different series) and secret keys.
The game is super crazy fun, but with some caveats.
-The AI is 100% classic arcade which means only the last seconds matter. You can drive as bad as you want it's all about the last section of the course.
-The extra courses are welcomed, but they are very short.
-No online. Come on...no online in 2023? This would be fantastic to play online. Raw Thrills said that they would add it later if the game was successful, but this is a feature that should be there from the beginning. (Btw still no online even when Raw Thrills tweeted that the game was indeed successful).

Now having said all that I would still recommend it. This kind of crazy arcade racing, the one with zero realism is missing from today's scene. Plus you can drive a shark, what more do you want?

+ Sehr wild
+ Einzelne Rennen können neugestartet werden während eines Cups (gut um Gold/silber zu farmen)
+ Alle Fahrzeuge aufleveln
+ Sehr witzige Strecken und Fahrzeuge (Dinos, Helikopter, Hai)
~ Nettes Arcade geballer, aber mehr auch nicht

Arcade racing games of the 90s are long gone, but many got ported to home consoles and became living room favorites. Cruis'n USA comes to mind for the Nintendo 64. It was a thrilling fast-paced arcade game with great visuals and tracks. Cruis'n Blast emulates this perfectly but lacks content and polish.

You start out with a selection of about five real-world licensed cars. This alone kind of surprised me as licenses like these are expensive. More cars can be unlocked by getting gold in the Tour mode and finding keys hidden throughout tracks. These keys can be kind of a pain to get and aren't placed in the best spots, but the game remembers what ones you have picked up and they unlock vehicles accumulatively. There are only five tracks in the entire game and it gets repetitive very quickly. The first three tours can be pretty exciting as there is so much going on on-screen that you can miss some things. The game emphasizes dinosaurs and natural disasters by throwing tornados, prehistoric animals, helicopter chases, police chases, and even UFO chases through each level.

The levels are a lot of fun to look at with so much color and neon popping out on screen. The levels are full of speed boosts, massive jumps and drops, and the ability to do wheelies, spins, and backflips plus you can drift to boost or use a boost canister. You get three at the start of each race, but you can buy extra with earned cash. All of this starts to fall apart a bit once you get used to each track. The drifting mechanic feels tacked on and an afterthought as most tracks don't have crazy turns. In fact, a majority of the tracks are mostly just straight-aways. I also had issues with the upgrades as they felt trivial thanks to the awful AI. No matter how fast you go or how perfectly you drive the AI won't let you catch up until the last part of the race. This happened over and over again and it became frustrating. I would start out with a starter boost and still be in last place until halfway through the race.

There are other issues such as janky physics. The cars bounce around like balls and the physics overall are really floaty but in a cheap way. Cars clip through the ground when they do flips and you can take down cars kind of like in Burnout, but not it's unclear what exactly triggers a takedown. When you finish a race you get awarded cash and you can use that to buy upgrades for your car. These range from the engine to body to buying neon. However, as I stated earlier, I don't see the point in racing these same five tracks over and over just to unlock more upgrades. Each car has five levels and it takes about three tours to fully upgrade a car so about 12 races and getting first in each one. That's incredibly tedious. To top this tedium off there are the same five tours on other difficulties, but it doesn't seem to change as the AI is so bad.

Overall, there is multiplayer which I recommend playing, but with so little content I don't see a reason to play outside of the first normal tour mode. If there were double or triple the number of tracks this game would be well worth the full asking price, but the jankiness of the physics and overall afterthought in drifting and upgrades, plus the terrible AI just makes this a literal evening thrill and nothing more. It looks damn good and the stuff going on in the tracks is fun, but it lasts about as long as a piece of Juicy Fruit.

This game is pure bliss. Cruis'n is the absolute king of the arcade racer to this day right next to the likes of Hydro Thunder. Yeah, all of these games have the same Rubber banding garbage that won't allow you to win a race until the last 30 seconds, but that doesn't make the game any less fun. If anything, it just means you have to make your limited boosts count the most. Car selection starts out small and not that impressive, but as more races are won and hidden keys on every track are found, the car roster starts to fill out very nicely. From motorcycles, to quads, to even UFO's, Attack Helicopters, Battle Tanks, and even just straight up Dinosaurs, Sharks, and Unicorns. Every car and animal can also be completely customized with whatever color of your choice, as well as all of them having an intricate, but simple level up system where you can unlock new looks for them. The game also has time trials and a mode that lets you play the original arcade versions tracks as they were in 2017. Local 4 player split screen is also supported, which is incredibly cool. The devs have also promised Brand new tracks and even online multiplayer in a future FREE update. If you've been starved for the return of the arcade racer, picking this up is an absolute no brainer, but maybe wait to get it on sale. $40 is a bit steep for a game that you can get through relatively quickly still. I suggest anything $25 or under is a good grab for this.

A beefy upgrade to one of the best arcade racing experiences out there. While some of the tracks are either mirrored or reskinned, I personally didn't mind at all. The collectibles and crazy unlockable racers really helped me appreciate this game even more than I already did. But how is there not any online for it? Racing people online in Cruis'n would have been incredible.

Also please Nintendo, bring back more racing IPs just like this. You have so many under your belt, don't let Mario Kart have all the fun!

Cruisn Blast follows the over-the-top arcade racing gameplay style that has been a characteristic of the series since the first game in the 90s but increases it to a different level. Levels have all sorts of dynamic changes in the environments that include explosions, earthquakes and crazy jumps; while vehicles range from normal racing cars to helicopters, dinosaurs, etc. I always loved the insane over the top presentation of the previous games so naturally love how this game takes this to the umpteenth level.

The performance is pretty good in the Nintendo Switch and the game does a good job encouraging players to replay different levels and circuits several times in order to get upgrades and new vehicles. It would have been nice to have more levels available.