[h2] Absolute utter disappointment [/h2]
As the name Rally Arcade Classics suggests, we will be playing a racing game, which will try to look like old-school rally arcades. Visual part is OK, game is running on Unity, what isn't a bad thing a I think that retro-rally vibe is well captured - plus point for being able to play in 480p, like in good old times. HOWEVER, I've encountered a lot of visual bugs or simple elements that have been done slapdash. Skybox is bad, in Greece races there are png-mountains in the background, which look very weak. With Ultra drawing distance, you will often see how very distant part of the track is slowly rendering, instead of being preloaded from the start, what looks kinda uncanny. Game has no brightness setting at all, what is a problem, since night races are dark as the inside of a cow and if you are sitting in a sunlit room, then you are probably not gonna see a lot of things. The light from car's headlamps is poorly coded - like if you are close to another object or car, light gets super shiny and object loses the texture and becomes white with yellowish accent, until headlamps are put in the different direction.
Game modes? Well, there are a lot and at the same time none:
First of all, game will tell you that in order to race, you will need to earn your license. One license equals one chapter in the Career (later about it). In the license, you will have to complete 10 time attacks with cars from this class. What does it mean "to complete"? There are 3 medals - Bronze (just finish the race), Silver (turn on your brain) and Gold ("Darks Souls level" of difficulty). Well, you just need to finish the race, so only bronze is enough to get the license. Of course, you can get a gold on every single time attack - that will give you... nothing, except for the achievement. No bonus car, no livery, no congratulation of some kind. No-thing.
Game has a career named "Tour" with 6 chapters - for FWD, AWD, RWD cars and their Rally prototypes. Usual cars can be bought with money, while for Rally cars you will need to farm the Arcade Mode, as they can only be won. One chapter has 12 sets of events - 3x5 time attacks, 3x5 VS, 3x5 drifts and 3x5 races. Now here we are make the stop, as I need to clarify, what is the problem with all of them:
Gold requirements for time attacks for the first 2 chapters (FWD & FWD R) are actually very adequate and can be achieved. In chapter 3 (AWD) bullcrap starts appearing. Chapter 4 (RWD) was the easiest for me, as I've 1st-tried all the events for gold - game was clearly balanced around rear-wheel drive cars, as those have arguably the best handling. And in the last 2 chapters difficulty will strike again, mainly due to dumb track design and Monte-Carlo races (oh, we will talk about it as well).
[i] > How can one get good? [/i]
There are no in-game advices, no manual, nothing. You can only race against your own ghost. But it will take a lot of time to somehow improve the time. Game HAS the leaderboards, but you cannot race with someone's ghost. Why? If the gold goal is 40 seconds and TOP-1 finishes in 30 seconds (using authomatic gearbox), then either there is some unique way to be faster and he has some secret knowledge or he is a cheater. And, long story short, you can cheat your time in the Leaderboards, but later about it.
VS mode or rather Hunter reminds me of NFS No Limits with races, where you have to catch the opponent, which has started 500-1000m further than you. Depending on your car, those races can be either obnoxiously easy or insanely hard. The main problem of this half-assed game is the fact that Devs didn't even bother to change default Unity Physics for objects and that's why collision with opponents will result in either full-stop of your car or the opponent will be bumped forward, while you will slow down to like 30 km/h. Your opponent drives the same route every race, so it is just a time-attack - the funniest thing is that he has a fixed speed, so often your rival can just rubberband or phase through you. Oh, and his car doesn't slide, very fair.
Drift is fun. The most fun it is of course with RWD cars. After 4th chapter, gold requirements become inadequate. Imagine that you have to score 10k drift points in an almost straight road, with close to no corners... on the asphalt, where cars are too grippy. Restarted decision for sure. But fear not, as Devs didn't care enough to make game not count your points, if you are driving back to the start of the race. Or if you are doing donuts. Absolute cinema of incompetence. Moreover, have I already told you that those points can be cheated xD???
Race is a... race. Same track as in time attack, but now you need to overtake 4 racers. Remember about idiotic physics of cars collision? Well, you will experience it again. Very fun trying to overtake someone on a narrow-ass road, which is simply not meant to be used in this kind of race. But again, this is Devs vision. After half of the game, you will stop enjoying those.
[b] Main problem with the Tour is the lack of... completionist feeling? Yeah, you will get some cars for completing the chapter with all golds (what is insanely hard due to game's junkiness and inadequate requirements), but after last chapter completion... nothing. No "You've won the Tour", no "congratulations", no credits (there are no credits in the game at all). All of it feels like "Start->Won->Next Race-> Rinse and Repeat". [/b]
Arcade Mode is a set of 4 races, which you need to complete with the specific car. Win them all and you will get Rally version of that car. Pretty much all of them are easy. And Rally is... a rally. There are difficulty levels, but those are restarted - for Easy you can forget how to drive, for Medium you can drive like a maniac and be 5 seconds ahead and with Hard you will be losing 2 seconds every race because it's an unbalanced ♥♥♥♥. You cannot restart a single race and you have no rewind. Good luck restarting the whole 11 Hard races because of 1 small mistake.
Track design, well, it's mid-bad. There are 4 countries - Finland, Greece, Catalunya and Monte-Carlo. Finland has ok rally races in dirt with pretty-much normal layout. Greece has sand races in mountains, but some obstacles like grids on the outside and inside of the track. In normal games, you can get through them, but here Devs didn't care again and it stops your car at flat 0 km/h. Anything, little rocks, little bushes. In Catalunya there are more city races and there you will see some white and red blocks, that are there for limiting the track. Those have corners sticking out and if you car touches them it will like stick to it. Monte-Carlo is a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ - narrow tracks, stone grids (which instantly stops your car, if you touch it), snowy weather, when your car ALWAYS drifts. It is simply absurdal.
The max limit of Steam Review Length is close, so another downsides:
Co-driver lines bugged;
No map;
Vibration always on;
Weak sound-design;
Bad localization (ai prompts).
Drift score and time attack result can be modified via Cheat Engine or ArtMoney, there are races with gold for 50 seconds and some guy finished in 26 seconds (2nd place is 45). So no fair competition.
It started good. With time game has become absolutely unenjoyable. Rally Arcade Classics simply cannot recreate the good part of the experience from retro-rally games. There is a mass of things that are wrong on the fundamental level and I'm generally surprised how did those things manage to get into the final release of the game, so I'll assume game wasn't tested properly. Game has no personality, no soul and the difficulty spike is absurdal, would love to see Devs themselves finish the game with gold medals.
[b] Absolutely don't even bother with it [/b]
