Forever Drive, Supermono Studio’s insane-ambitious racing game where you, pals, and total e-strangers will compose and create the game’s uber-highway, is still coming “soon.” No hard date has been set, in other words, but while the studio crunches, it’s been churning out a beauty of a teaser trailer that I think does an awesome job in expressing the game’s core mechanics and fleshes out what sets it apart from other top-down racers.
In brief, this is Supermono’s attempt to shake-up the racing model. Most racing games give you an assortment of well-designed, though never-changing tracks to compete on. Forever Drive will attempt to always provide something new via the sorcery of user creation. Basically, you'll be charged with constructing pieces of tracks with others that'll be combined into one huge highway. It's a cool idea.
Will this work out? I dunno, man! But I guess that's what makes following this game so fun. It looks great and has a ton of promise. Definitely stay tuned to us as we follow it.
Last month, developers Polarbit and Pixelbite Games delivered Reckless Getaway [$2.99] into the App Store, a game we liked a lot in our review. In Reckless Getaway, you play as a bank robber who is desperately trying to evade a police pursuit immediately following a bank heist. The goal is to make it past the police barricade that marks the end of each level while racking up as many points as possible along the way, and avoiding taking too much damage in the process.
Firemint sales used to be a much more rare occurrence, but they still have an electricity to them that other creators can’t capture with their own price-slashing parties. I’m guessing it has more to do with the quality of the wares, than it does with dramatic price shifts. While I pointlessly ponder this, go ahead and grab Real Racing and Real Racing 2 for the iPhone or iPad. All four games have been dramatically reduced in price for this weekend in celebration of… well, nothing that we can discern. Still! They’re cheaper!
Real Racing 2 is, we reckon, the best racing game Firemint has produced. That doesn’t mean the original Real Racing is a slouch, though. Fans of simulation racing games can and will enjoy both; it’s just that Real Racing 2 is a fantastic iteration on that original foundation. If you want to know way more about either of these titles, we’ve got your back. You can check out a review of the follow-up here and a review of Real Racinghere. Non-spoiler: they’re good.
One thing about Shift 2: Unleashed [$5.99/HD], just real quick: Don't bother. If I had to summarize EA's latest Need for Speed sim, it certainly wouldn't involve the word "unleashed." This is about as misleading a subtitle you could attach to something so tame and afraid to do anything outside its comfort zone.
I'm still high off the faster, crazier NFS: Hot Pursuitand the dialed back Real Racing 2, I think. Shift 2 exists in a limbo-like spot somewhere in between those titles, with a slightly heavier weight toward the realistic racing, which is something the franchise has only recently started dabbling in. We loved the first Need for Speed: Shift because it nailed what we wanted from a console approximation and it was a convincing, competitive iOS sim-racer. This sequel hits those same notes, but the standard, and thus what I expect, has raised since.
We got a look at a few screenshots of Speedway GP 2011last month, and while we're still incredibly light on details regarding what's going to be in the actual game, they shot us over a new trailer today which features an entire six seconds of gameplay footage.
As I write this, you could be designing your own Snuggle Truck [$.99 / HD] levels in the brand new update to the physics-based driving game. Owlchemy Labs’ dropped us an e-letter this morning stating that Apple had blessed the titanic update, and it also revealed that, in celebration, Snuggle Truck will be sold at 30-50 percent off the normal price. For the next 24 hours, you can grab the game on iPhone and iPod for $.99, or on the iPad for $1.99. That’s a cool deal! I think!
Just as a light re-cap if you missed our previous coverage, the level editor is a drag-and-drop deal, similar to the one in LittleBigPlanet. Also, like LBP, you’ll be able to upload your creators or play, share, and rate other peoples’ levels through a new web portal. This update also rolls in a much-needed UI flip, some balance tweaks, and other little fixes.
We’ve seen a lot of crazy updates in our time, but rare are the ones that change the face of a game. Granted, Snuggle Truck will continue to be a title about cute animals that you need to escort back to the zoo, but now it can also boast a previously unexplored sandbox aspect that really tries to tickle the creation itch. What’s next? A built-in text editor?
Supermono Studio, the same studio who achievement-ized standard non-game tasks like chores and scrubbing behind your ears in the stupendous Epic Win [$2.99], are close to releasing its next game, Forever Drive.
Forever Drive, if you didn't know, is a futuristic racing game, complete with track building and neat customization elements, sorta like ModNation Racers. The coolest element, on paper at least, is its online, perpetual city. Supermono describes the game as “Outrun-meets-SimCity-in-the-future-online,” if you need some analogues.
Of course, it also dropped some screenshots. There’s probably a great word for this kind of art style, but because my brain doesn't work so great all the time, I’ll just say it looks great (in a TRON kind of way) and let you tell me my business in the comments.
If you’re familiar with this project, you might be wondering why it’s now called Forever Drive instead of "Drive Forever." According to Supermono, there’s a legal reason for the flip. It didn't go into the details in the official blog's latest post, probably because the story would be REALLY boring.
It also didn't discuss release date. We've got in touch and hope to bring you that information and more in the near future.
Ever since the success of Death Rally [99¢] earlier this year, there has been somewhat of a resurgence in isometric racing titles with an emphasis on weapons and destruction. And why not? There’s nothing cooler than setting up a shot in your souped-up racer and blowing apart the leader right before taking the checkered flag. Mad Wheels [99¢/Lite/HD] attempts to ride on this wave of enthusiasm and success and, while the title does a decent job nailing the core gameplay, its lack of any real customization definitely hurts replayability.
Simply put, many aspects of Mad Wheels are, well, simple. There are only two single player modes: a ‘Championship’ mode that has the player race through 25 tracks across four “regions,” and a randomized Quick Race option. In addition, there is no story to speak of; the only motivation to continue playing is a progression bar that goes up every time a race is won or objective is met. While Mad Wheels offers a half dozen cars to choose from (with three more as IAP), each vehicle has fixed weapons and stats, with no options for upgrades or improvements. This drastically decreases any potential replayability, as once you go through each track and nail all the objectives, there’s nothing else to play towards.
In addition to the concerns above, there are some glaring omissions in Mad Wheels that definitely detract from the overall experience. For example, there are no save states or ‘multitasking’ support within this game. In other words, if you’re playing on your iPad, and you decide to exit out to check your email, you’ve just lost any progress you had on your current race and need to start over. This lack of any save state is almost unacceptable in this day and age. In addition, Mad Wheels only uses the Crystal social network system and doesn’t even integrate Game Center. This isn’t necessarily a big deal, but still surprising considering how Game Center is poised to be the primary gaming service once the next version of iOS comes out.
Not everything is bad, however. Mad Wheels has decent graphics with a stable, fast framerate (with a visual style that makes me wish Blast Corp was on iOS). In addition, the game controls pretty well, emulating Death Rally and providing an overall decent gameplay experience. While the weapons are predictable, they are implemented nicely and preserve the enjoyment of blasting apart your opponents. Furthermore, Mad Wheels also incorporates a Wi-Fi multiplayer mode, allowing gamers to join and host multiplayer races.
Despite its issues, Mad Wheels still manages to preserve some of the fun involved with these types of weapon racers. If you’re looking for a simple, weapons-based racer with multiplayer and don’t care about customizability or excessive replayability, then Mad Wheels may be a title worthy of your attention. If you’re looking for a game with more substance and depth, then Death Rally still remains the perennial favorite and recommended title.
Arnold and Jared's obsession over the last six months saw another update this afternoon. If you haven't heard of Disc Drivin [Free / $1.99 / HD] yet, you should really check out our review. It's a really slick asynchronous online multiplayer racing game. Think of it as shuffleboard meets Mario Kart meets Words With Friends.
Anyway, Disc Drivin 1.7 is here, which brings a number of new tracks and obstacles that we detailed a few days ago:
This newest update adds another 3 brand new tracks, for a total of 18, as well as a new track element called the Flipper. You can see the overhead design of each of the tracks in the icons below:
As for the Flipper, pictured at the top of this post, you’ll come across this obstacle placed in various parts of the ground in each of the 3 new tracks. When you slide over it, it propels you forwards and upwards, catapult style. This can either be a very good thing or a very bad thing, mostly depending on where you end up finally landing. The faster you’re going when you hit the Flipper, the farther you’ll get launched, so there should be some good strategic uses of the new object if utilized correctly.
So what are you waiting for? You can play the game for free, and the update is now live. Go start some games on the new tracks and let us know what you think of them.
All of my two-wheel racing experience resides in that one Moto GP game that came on the Xbox Live demo disc. Because I couldn’t compete, I drove backwards around the tracks while making funny noises over the microphone. I’m not so sure that I’ll be able to rekindle those times in Polish developer Vivid Games’ Speedway GP 2011 for iOS, but it sure does look like a sharp title that strokes all the right notes of a proper simulation racing game.
That was all build-up to get to the point of telling you that Vivid shot us over some fresh images of the racing title. Also, I wanted to give you a release date: August 25th for the iPhone, iPod Touch, and the iPad.
As its namesake implies, Speedway GP 2011 is a BSI Speeday game, kinda like how Madden is an NFL game. It’ll launch with, as you see, some pretty hot visuals and, of course, realistic physics. The craziest thing I’ve learned so far while checking out the pre-release intel is that these racers don’t use brakes, nor will you be able to. Yeah, I know. Wild!
Speedway GP 2011 will also launch with 11 stadiums, a “full roster of statistics” and real-time stat-tracking of the Speedway Grand Prix. There’s another app on the App Store that appears to have your back on that, too, if you’re especially interested.
Stay tuned for some more in-depth coverage as the game races (huh, huh!?) to the App Store a little later next month.
We've been keeping an eye on Dream Track Nation [$0.99] since we caught a peek of it on Chillingo's YouTube channel earlier this year. Even back in the depths of April, it looked like a leader in the 2D physics racing genre. Now that it's reached the finish line, the question remains -- is it a winner? Well, it's complicated.
If you're really into games like the Jelly Car [Free] series, then you're going to want this game. It has familiar 2D cars and levels, similarly wacky physics and a lot of content to enjoy. A ridiculous amount of content for its $0.99 price tag, in fact.
The sheer volume of content is Dream Track Nation's main selling point. The game includes 60 levels that can be played in star collect mode. Then you can play them again in time trial mode, which is a notably different experience. Throughout these modes you'll unlock vehicles to play with. You can also play the official levels against another racer in multiplayer mode. If you get bored of the built-in content, you can download new levels made by other players. Any time you don't feel like racing, you can work on building your own masterpiece of a level, which you can then upload to share with the world at large. It's frankly unreasonable that a game with so much content should be so cheap. It's basically Sony's whole "Play. Create. Share" model wrapped up in a one dollar package.
It should be no secret that we’re pretty big Disc Drivin’ [$1.99/Free/HD] junkies around here at TouchArcade. Well, almost all of us (I’m looking at you, Eli). Disc Drivin’ launched back in December of last year, and we were pretty much hooked following our review. Since that time, I’ve continued to play the game every single day without fail, and I honestly can’t say that about any other iOS game.
But lately, I’ve noticed that my playtime (and the playtime of the many dedicated friends that I am usually playing with) has started to dwindle. Normally I’m running at least 15 to 20 games at a time, but in the past few weeks that number has shrunken down to a mere 4 or 5, sometimes less. As can happen in even the best of relationships, things were just starting to get a bit stale around the Nelson-Drivin’ household.
Enter developer Pixelocity Software, ready like Cupid to shoot a new update into the posterior of Disc Drivin’ and ignite our romance once more. This marks the third big content update to the game, as it received online matchmaking back in February and 3 brand new tracks as well as a refined UI back in April. This newest update adds another 3 brand new tracks, for a total of 18, as well as a new track element called the Flipper. You can see the overhead design of each of the tracks in the icons below:
As for the Flipper, pictured at the top of this post, you’ll come across this obstacle placed in various parts of the ground in each of the 3 new tracks. When you slide over it, it propels you forwards and upwards, catapult style. This can either be a very good thing or a very bad thing, mostly depending on where you end up finally landing. The faster you’re going when you hit the Flipper, the farther you’ll get launched, so there should be some good strategic uses of the new object if utilized correctly.
If you haven’t yet tried Disc Drivin', I highly recommend downloading the fully-featured ad-supported version for free and giving the game a spin. It’s one of those games that you won’t be good at right away, so give it time and practice. You can ask advice or find opponents in the game’s discussion thread in our forums, too. If you like it, the ad-free version is currently $1.99, and you’d be fueling support for even more updates down the line. This newest update to Disc Drivin' is already done and submitted, so keep your eyes peeled for it to go live most likely sometime in the next week.
Just so we're all on the same page from the start, Bravo Game Studios'Xtreme Wheels [$3.99] is whole heck of a lot like RedLynx'sTrials series. Actually, it's almost identical, but while many have tried to bring the painfully difficult motocross physics-puzzle-style to iOS, Xtreme Wheels is probably the closest to getting it right.
If you've played Trials, you'll know what to expect from Xtreme Wheels and it gets the job done confidently enough. If you haven't, Xtreme Wheels is a physics based motrocross game that requires you to traverse an environment and get from one point of the map to the other by accelerating and leaning your character and bike in the correct directions to get through a series of obstacles.
That all sounds simple enough, but the joy (or rage) of Xtreme Wheels is in the fact you have to finesse your way up and over exploding barrels, ninety-degree walls and across tiny platforms. Like its pedigree, this isn't a game for the faint of heart and while the first few levels are far too easy, the last ten are truly a pain to get through.
The goal of each track is to get through it alive once, then to head back and improve your time. You'll receive medal awards based on your time and the number of crashes. Usually, you'd spend your time beating friend's scores on the leaderboards, but right now the Game Center boards are pretty screwed up, with the top times listed as zero. For this type of game, fixing this needs to be on the top of Bravo's to-do list.
You'll have four different control schemes at your disposal, two styles of analog sliders, a digital pad and tilt controls. For the most part, the analog slider is going to be the go-to for Trials fans, but newcomers might find the other controls more to their liking.
Whichever control scheme you chose, you'll be rolling with it over the course of 25 levels in five themed areas. Again, if you played Trials, you know what to expect here -- the level progression, although a bit slow at first, ramps up considerably and awkwardly at the mid-point (like Trials, actually). If you haven't played a game like this before, you're going to run into some serious trouble early on because the game doesn't do a particularly good job of teaching you how to play it. Simple things like bunny-hops are going to frustrate newcomers pretty quickly and even old hands will have a little trouble getting the hang of them with the control schemes.
That actually brings up one of the problems with Xtreme Wheels, the physics are a little loose compared to the responsiveness of the controls and since the level design facilitates some ridiculous situations, the physics don't always respond as you'd expect. It's only jarring because the controls are so reactive, your character will lean and move exactly as you'd anticipate, but the bike doesn't always respond. Then again, that might simply be the sixty-plus hours I've poured into Trials HD tainting my view a little.
One of the other major problems comes in the form of framerate hiccups. Both on a 3GS and an original iPad the game has serious slowdown after explosions and in some of the more complex areas. This isn't a good thing in this type of game and it's almost impossible to recover from. There are a ton of checkpoints throughout each level to keep this from being too aggravating, but for those looking to go gold on every level it'll only make the game even harder. The same goes for your inevitable fail animations, which seem to drag on as the system stutters.
From early screenshots, the game looked like it was going to be a real stunner. The environments hold up to the screenshots and look great, but the animation on the rider is a little stiff. This only matters because your rider's position is key to getting through tougher parts and it's occasionally a little difficult to figure out exactly where he's positioned. Of course, I'd have preferred a steady framerate over fancy visuals any day, so we'll see if they can scale the graphics down to add some smoothness in the future.
Despite those flaws, the game is a faithful rendition of a Trials-style game, but it would have been nice to see a little more innovation in the environmental art or at least more of its own style instead of a nearly direct clone of Trials. Even still, if they can get the framerate up, it'll be one of the better renditions on the App Store, even if it's lacking it's own constitution.
This past October, the development duo of Pixelbite and Polarbit brought us Reckless Racing [99¢/Lite/HD], a top-down racer with beautiful graphics and fun arcade-style physics that we really enjoyed in our review. Then last week, the developers announced a follow-up title to Reckless Racing titled Reckless Getaway [$2.99], a game with a similar visual style and floaty physics system but with a focus on escaping capture from the police while causing a ton of collateral damage along the way. The developers had stated that Reckless Getaway was inspired by classic titles like Spyhunter and the Burnout series, and you definitely could see that inspiration in the trailer for the game.
Though there was no release date announced along with the trailer last week, we were pleasantly surprised to see Reckless Getaway show up in the App Store later that day. After spending a good amount of time with the game, and even talking about it on our most recent podcast, I’m really pleased to report that Pixelbite and Polarbit have succeeded in bringing some of the best aspects of Reckless Racing into Reckless Getaway while offering a very different gameplay experience. There are a couple of quirks here and there, and an extra dose of content couldn’t hurt, but for the most part Reckless Getaway is an intense arcade experience with a ton of replay value that’s easy enough for anybody to pick up and have a great time with.
DrawRace [Free] just dropped to the low, low price of free for the day. This means one thing: If you don't already own it, you should download it immediately. DrawRace is a racing game that hinges around a remarkably clever line drawing mechanic where you draw the racing line for your car, and the speed that you do it at controls your car's accelerator and brakes.
My absolute favorite part of the game has definitely got to be the pass and play mode. Up to four players can play at once, taking turns drawing their racing lines. When everyone is done, the cars all race based on each player's input, and whoever managed to draw the best racing line wins. The drawing-based input method is so simple that you can play with total non-gamers and other people who otherwise would likely never be interested in a racing game, making DrawRace a great game to just keep on your phone. There's even a sequel on the way.
Seriously, if you don't download DrawRace I'm not sure we can be friends. Unless of course you've already downloaded it, in which case, hey buddy.
Firemint
One thing about Shift 2: Unleashed [
As I write this, you could be designing your own 
Supermono Studio, the same studio who achievement-ized standard non-game tasks like chores and scrubbing behind your ears in the stupendous Epic Win [$
Just so we're all on the same page from the start, 
