Sim, arcade, simcade, anything. I’m kinda disconnected from the genre and want to know what is considered the GOATs of racing games to try them out.
Me personally, I’d say Dirt Rally 2, very addicting gameplay.
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Gran Turismo and Forza. I love the simulation aspect, ain’t no way on Earth I want to drive a sports car. Too irresponsible.
Mario Kart for the social aspect.
Gran Turismo 4
Dirt Rally 2 Forza Horizons 4And the godking itself, Burnout 4 Revenge and its understudy Burnout 3.
Bonus point to Extreme-G and G2.
I’m also going to mention Generally. It was a tiny game with a small dedicated community but gods damn if it wasn’t just super fun to make maps and play community created events/maps/contests.
Oh god i almost forgot about generally. The laughs and the furious screams from the LAN parties of yesteryear were all brought up to the surface 🥲
I’ve got Gran Turismo 7 and it’s great in some ways but they ruined the pacing of the game. It hands out cars like they expire in less than a week. It can be fun to try out a whole bunch of different cars, but there’s not much sense of progression like the older ones gave.
I remember building a connection to some of the cars in older games. When you bought a car, it was meaningful because it took time to win enough money to afford something, and then I’d spend a while upgrading it until eventually hitting a ceiling and needing a better car to upgrade to progress to more races. And then add some variety with a few races with rules or restrictions along the way to give a reason to buy some other cards in the same tier, but then then it would be a big decision.
In GT7, all except the top end supercars feel like an afterthought, my garage gets filled for free as I win races, and any time I want to try a different car, first thing I do is buy most or all of the upgrades because it’s all trivial. Race with limiting rules? Ok, give me 5 minutes and I’ll find, buy, and max out another car to win this one.
Granted, it has more of an emphasis on the driving than the older ones did (where you could usually take your super car into whatever races your wanted and see how many times you could lap everyone), but I think I like the progressing through cars part more than the racing part and GT7 is disappointing in that regard compared to GT4 or GT3.
GT7 going back to its roots… most races in GT2 would vomit up a car at you… and also you had a 100 garage limit due to a hardware limitation.
Wipeout 2048 was my favourite of all time and is available in the Wipeout Omega Collection. I wouldn’t say that it’s better than the more recent titles but it was just the one that grabbed me.
I also really liked:
- Dirt Rally was ace on the PSVR
- Burnout Paradise
- Need for Speed: Most Wanted (the second one)
2048 is so good. I love the teams each having three craft types. The tracks are really fun, with both wide sections where you can go flat out without a care, and narrow parts where you have to really thread the needle and use the airbrakes with total precision.
If you haven’t already, check out BallisticNG. It’s a retro style re-implementation of the classic WipEout physics, and the upcoming update will fully implement the 2048 physics mode.
Burnout 2: Point of impact (got me into burnout) Burnout paradise Split/second
I have been addicted to Burnout Legends (PSP title) almost since it came out, I kinda want to try other old school Burnout games.
Also I like Mario Kart 8 for Switch.
Favourite racing game is always highly dependent on what I am looking for.
Forza Motorsport 4 (Not Horizon) was one of the best racing simcades i’ve enjoyed playing, it has solid sim-ish racing and it is very satisfying to build up a garage and take a car for a spin on some of the gorgeous original or real life racetracks. Unfortunately, it’s an xbox 360 exclusive and not backwards compatible on xbox one or series x, so not really playable on current systems. I am stll looking for a similar experience on a modern pc.
I also enjoy “Project Cars” and it’s sequel “Project Cars 2”. I can easily play the games on my current PC or the Steam Deck, but the game can be challenging on a gamepad - not impossible, but managable. It does lack some beautiful original tracks as it only features real life circuits and it does lack the satisfaction of having to “earn” and build up a collection of cars and making them your own. Unfortunately, both games have been delisted on storefronts and can no longer officially be purchased, but if you can get your hands on a PC Key, you can still enjoy the games on a modern system.
If I want to enjoy some sim racing, I’ll go with Assetto Corsa or Assetto Corsa Competizione. Great fun with a steering wheel, not really my thing with a gamepad. Modding possibilities for AC are basically endless on PC, but again, lacking some sort of progression system that will allow you to build up a car collection.
Forza Horizon 3 with its Hot-Wheels Expansion was probably my favourite open-world arcade racer, unfortunately it’s also delisted, and while I still have the physical xbox one version, that means I can’t play it on PC. Forza Horizon 4 (with the Lego expansion) is the next best thing (still far better than FH5) and is still available on PC, but will also be delisted in december (grab FH4 while you still can!)
I have also spent a lot of time playing Burnout Paradise, but I still prefer Burnout Revenge over it’s younger open-world brother.
Wreckfest is a great spiritual succesor to the already great Flatout 1/2 and certainly the best banger racer you can currently get. The damage model is very convicing and it’s good fun to wreck some CPU racers.
BLUR - an underrated battle racer, with a really fun 4 player splitscreen. Calling it “Mario Kart with real cars” is, imho a bit too simple, but it does get the point across quite well.
Need For Speed: Most Wanted (2005) - early 2000s yellow/brown tinted aesthetics aside, the game still looks good today and police chases can go on forever. Great fun.
Not a racing game, but a honorable mention: American/Euro Truck Simulator 2, bought it as a joke back then, but it does feel cathartic at times.
The absolute best arcade racer to me was always NFS Hot Pursuit 2 for PS2. The physics were so much fun and the cars were a curated selection of cool.
Always loved the Project Gotham Racing series, especially 3. Tons of fun to drift in those games. The Kudos system was definitely a unique feature.
Been playing through the Ridge Racer games most recently. Damn these are just fun to play.
Sega Rally Championship will always stand out as some of the best driving physics early on.
Art of Rally and Art of drift are hella fun “zen” games with a unique art style.
I was always a sucker for some of the cash-in Fast and Furious era car fad games. Juiced, Tokyo Extreme Racer (out before all of it) Street Racing Syndicate, NFS Underground, Midnight Club 3. They’re all fun but driving is always just ok.
My short list though: Gran Turismo 4 Forza Motorsport 4 or 6 (4 is less grindy I feel) NFS Most Wanted 2
I haven’t played a racing game since Need for Speed: Underground 2, and before that Carmageddon which probably doesn’t count. I have, though, seen a Group B Audi Quattro like in the thumbnail. It was in a heritage rally and it sounded FANTASTIC.
I reinstalled NFSU2 a couple of weeks ago. Still a lot of fun.
I’ve been playing beam ng drive on my steam deck recently. Haven’t got any experience with other driving games but I’m having a lot of fun with it.
How well does it run?
Tbh I don’t even know how to find out how many frames per second it gives me! It seems pretty sweet to me though. I don’t think it can manage much in the way of traffic, I’m told three other cars is about the limit. That’s not been a problem for me though, I’m mostly either playing rally car on a mountain or trying to climb rocks in a 4wd. There’s a lot to do that I’ve not experimented with yet.
Any AG racing fans in here?
BalisticNG is my latest main game, but my love began with the WipEout series.
I also enjoy Redout and Redout 2, but the lack of weapons means I can only go so long before needing to play WipEout or BNG again.
Obligatory mention of !ballisticng@sopuli.xyz
Redout 1 and 2 are great fun if I’m in the mood for lap times, but I hate racing against the NPCs.
Major fan hear. BallisticNG is such a love letter to WipEout, its fantastic
Super Tux Kart
Found the Linux user
You mean Linux newbie.
Sim drifting on Asetto Corsa is the only “racing” i do these days.
Need For Speed Underground 2 I would list as a solid GOAT for the genre of open world arcade racing.
I had to scroll way too far down to find this. The open world and vehicle customization were ahead of their time. Supposed to be a super upgraded fan mod for the PC port coming that makes it pretty for modern systems.
At the moment Assetto Corsa and Wreckfest.
Assetto Corsa because it’s a simracing sandbox. I’ve modded it to hell with Content Manager and CSP. I also have a lot of paid mods for mainly formula cars like the RSS Formula 1/2/3/4 cars and the VRC Formula E cars. The AI is the perfect level of silly to cause absolute mayhem with the right settings, but also pretty interesting races when you want them to behave.
Wreckfest is a joy on the Steam deck and for casual mayhem. It still has a nice driving model imo, while remaining casual. The maps are optimized for crashing into others which means you’re never safe.
In terms of play time its probably Ridge racer type 4 for psx and the wipeout series followed by Mario kart.
Seconding R4, truly have high replayability value due to its unlock system & how every car handles differently. Not to mention the great soundtrack that I never get bored of.
