Underrated Battle Racer. All-Time Favorite for me. What’s great about it, is the combat and hardcore speed combine into literally the most thrilling shit on the system. The weapons are balanced in a way that gives you a shot even in 3rd or fourth place. With an overcharge fire mechanic rather than some cheap super you’re allowed when you already hit last place.

A skilled player in first can circumvent even the “blue shell” type weapon. Then you have the racing, with a variety of slick tracks and different vehicle types to use. Your car gets slippery if you recklessly boost, or even hard turn, at high speeds. So u really gotta watch your ass. Much like the also amazing (and clearly more popular) Crash Team Racing from Naughty Dog, boosting kicks ass, and you get more for jumping, drifting, and nabbing blue eco.

The single player campaign heavily improves on CTR. Rather than awkwardly parking your ass on coins in an empty hub world to play a level, you just pick one of several missions on a menu. Earn enough medals, race in a big match along with a rival. And watch Jak and Daxter increasingly annoy a TV host. I’m grateful this game gives u one simple goal: win the race, win the fight, hold the potato. Unlike, “Crash Bandicoot and the adventures of collecting a bunch of letters in the corner and then having to win the race”.

Various missions include time trials with freeze power ups, death arenas, boost-fests, standard races, and reverse hot potato.

I just feel like there’s so much to praise here. The amazing fucking soundtrack and hardcore death race vibe is perfect for the edgy extremity of the Jak sequels, but they also have colorful, naturalistic race tracks reminiscent of Jak 1 (the best one) and glorious opera vocals.

“WAM BAM THANK YOU MAM”
“SEIMOS TAUGHT ME WELL!”
“Jaak! Are you crazy?! You ruined my story!”

Like bruh. They’ll never make another game like this? Naughty Dog will only ever make 3rd person Super Story Shooters? Damn.

If you know of any game that’s like this, or at least of racing games with strong solo campaigns then please enlighten me.

Reviewed on Aug 09, 2023


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