When Disney/Pixar’s Cars game, the latest movie license inspired title came across my desk I was torn between feelings of misery and hope. Misery, because the odds of someone making a decent game based on a movie are slim, and hope, because Rainbow Studios has made some phenomenal racing games over the years. I have to say that I was mildly surprised with the way this game turned out.
Rainbow Studios has managed to capture the look and feel of the movie very well, replicating the town of Radiator Springs to use as a central location in this mostly open ended and non-linear game. Cut scenes inspired from the Cars movie were used to develop the main story line that ties the whole game together. The main premise is to make it to and compete in the Piston Cup, the Cars universe’s version of the NASCAR series. Along the way you need to guide Lightening McQueen through both races and mini-games on his way to winning the coveted Piston Cup. There races are mostly straight forward, where the mini games have you doing things like retrieving lost postcards or running through obstacle courses. As you win race events and complete mini-games you will unlock further events and race environments. The unlocking of events in nice because they usually come through the completion of story events and help to keep the story moving and coherent in the non-linear environment.
Graphics in Cars are very nice with strong vibrant colours and nicely rendered animation. While they can’t match the pre-rendered visual quality of the Cars movie, frame rates are smooth and everything looks polished. The sound is decent with the expected vehicle and environment noises present and is mixed so that one isn’t noticeably louder then the other. The real strongpoint on the sound side is the quality voice work done by the cast of the movie. As the official game literature states, Cars “Features major voice talent from the Movie” and while most clips are small and repetitive outside of story elements, it does tie the game in with the movie nicely.
Taking into consideration that this is intended for a younger audience, the actual racing component of the game is not all that it could have been. Controls are very basic. Gas, Brake, and steering are pretty much all you get or need. You mash the gas, let up a little in the corners, and you can win most conventional racing challenges in this game. As an experiment I set up my trusty Logitech Momo force feedback steering wheel to see if the game supports it. As it turns out, it is detected as a controller, and after a little configuration it was good to go. Unfortunately there is no real force feedback, and the steering felt laggy and slow. Controlling the cars with the keyboard was actually easier, as that input method gives you immediate full turning with the press of a key. You often had to saw back and forth on the wheel to make corrections or on sharp corners. There is also a fairly large dead spot in the middle that causes you to overseer sometimes as you make large steering changes. Dead spots in racing games are normal so you can rest with the wheel in the center position, but with no way to set it in this game, it makes using a wheel more difficult then it should.
In defense of the Cars game, it wasn’t really intended to be played with a wheel as the physics model isn’t that precise. By themselves the keyboard controls aren’t bad, but it sometimes feels that the cars are stuck to the ground in rails and sliding is frowned upon. It is very hard to slide your car through a turn as any application of the break will stop the slide. If there was a little more sliding like in Bugbears Flatout, or any of Rainbow Studio’s previous games, the driving experience would have been a little more exciting. Also mildly annoying is the system to bring wayward racers back onto the track when they get into trouble. While I understand that younger racers may get frustrated if they drive off the track and get too far behind to catch up, the system is too strict and eager to fix your "problem". If you are a little too aggressive and cut the inside of a corner to make a pass, you run the risk of being reset to back on the track, sometimes behind the car you just passed. As with the lack of true sliding, the auto-reset feature dampens the otherwise enjoyable racing experience.
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There is also an issue with invisible boundaries and inconsistent physics in the game. Cars is ostensibly an open ended game where you can roam around at will and complete races and mini-games in the order you want. What is strange then is that in some places you can jump over fences and obstacles, where in other spots you jump over a seemingly identical object. What it boils down to is that the open game play areas are actually constructed out of smaller units and are all joined together. There are definite paths to take between areas and you will sometimes run into the boundaries which are invisible and seemingly random. The other issue is that some items are destructible, like fences and sound posts in the drive-in, where other places posts and fences are indestructible. I understand that not everything can be made to be destroyable, but there are just enough items around, which you would thing you can break and can’t, that it leaves you feeling like the game was rushed or not fully constructed.
Overall the Cars game from THQ is an enjoyable experience that is a fun continuation of the Cars movie. Younger racers won’t really care too much about the auto-reset and lack of sliding all that much and should be engrossed in the unfolding storyline. For older gamers though, it has too little adrenaline filled racing for car fans, and too much racing for the adventure game types. Compared to other movie related games that have been released over the years, Cars isn’t an abdominal failure, which is quite an achievement. While it won’t do much for older gamers, parents looking for a safe family game on their PC or Mac (which is hard these days), THQ’s Cars is a good choice.
WHAM! Rating: |
7.5 out of 10 |
ESRB Rating: |
E (Everyone) |
Official Web Site: |
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