You can also get more Wisps via an in-game shop, where you trade in tickets won after every race to upgrade your Wisps and make them more powerful. Mid-race, you get Wisps at a pretty generous rate, with some maps feeling like you never really take a corner without bumping into yet another chance to get more items to help you get ahead. If you don’t time that missile at a time when you have the tools to overtake, it just becomes a way to let your opponent know you dislike them instead of a way to take the lead. Whether an intentional balancing feature or not, it makes it so Wisps are more of a tool to take back the lead, not a crutch. Unlike its contemporary, Mario Kart, you don’t spin out for very long. The effects of getting hit are where I’m most curious about the game design. I’m especially a fan of the Red Eagle, which fires a missile at anyone with the audacity to overtake you. At a glance you couldn’t tell, and you’ll need to go back to the menu to confirm what each one does.Ībility-wise though, they’re plenty great. Admittedly, I wish they were more straightforward in telling you what they did. There’s also the game’s Wisps, which act as items. Just clipping the boost pad will activate it, so there’s a lot of strategy to be had around hitting the boost pad efficiently to take back a lead. The collision on the boost pads is *really* generous. You want to collect rings to speed up your car, as well as hit boost pads and avoid obstacles which will slow you down. That being said, the game is still quite skill based. That isn’t me, and I’m glad that it’s a lot more simplified for this reason. Admittedly, if you’re any kind of racing fan you’d probably want something more complex.
Literally just tap the direction to steer your car, and as long as you’re holding it your car will drift in that direction.
I really like the control scheme for Sonic Racing for how simple it is. When You’re Super Sonic Racing, There’s No Time To Look Around If you so desired you could totally set up your bot to win, and have your character be built around collecting the game’s Wisp powerups and smiting anyone who gets too close to them. You get a pick of Sonic characters for your three-man lineup, all with their own stats. There’s also the advantage of it being a team game- you don’t have to place first to win. But for the most part the game was very much built around the idea of this 1v1+2 racing, and it works out that way. This isn’t always the case though, since one of the game types lets you duke it out with 3 other players. Yet rather than be a 1v1, the bots add some nice flavor to it, still giving you people to overtake. Follow really like the setup of this, since it lets you have what is ostensibly a 6-man race without any of the problems of connecting to 5 other people- you only have one opponent, which means only one risk of disconnecting.