Screamer

[b]‣ INTRO TO SCREAMER[/b] Screamer (2026) is an arcade racing game with a story mode based on multiple characters participating in a car racing tournment called "Screamer". The story is already engaging enough, but the gameplay is great too. It has a lot of driving mechanics that feel very fun to use, even for beginners. But, if you can master the controls, it'll be even better. Overall, this is a great car game that breaks a little away from the typical formula we've seen lately in AAA racing games. The visuals are very pretty (even beautiful at some points), the characters and effects have an anime-ish style to them, while the rest of the world looks a bit more realistic and beautiful. This combination of styles works pretty well for me, just like it did in [url=store.steampowered.com/app/1846380/Need_for_Speed_Unbound/]NFS Unbound[/url]. [i]Also, anything I marked with a "black bar" in this review can be considered small spoilers for some parts of the story.[/i] [b]‣ CARS & TRACKS[/b] The cars (which are made up, not real brands) are very good looking, and the texture work on them is insanely detailed. Each car has a set of stats and each character has their own car, you can't mix and match or upgrade them. This isn't a bad thing, in my opinion, since you can challenge yourself to get used to each character/car. However, you can costumize them visually, with items you randomly obtain from finishing races with each specific car. But the customization system feels a little confusing, and you're mostly only changing colours, so I think it could've had some improvement. There is a total of 32 tracks. They all look great, and most of them are fun to drive through. There aren't any crazy jumps or tricks, but there are a lot of turns where drifting feels great, and each track has at least one secret shortcut to find. You can race in a total of four environments (city, forest, industrial zone and [spoiler]space station[/spoiler]), and each one of them has 8 different tracks, taking place at different times of day and weather. So, even though there are only four big locations, most tracks feel different enough, mostly. They all look pretty as hell though, and have a lot of details and stuff happening in the environment around them. [b]‣ STORY & CHARACTERS[/b] The story is the main atraction of Screamer, in my opinion. It is told through either a few fully animated cutscenes, or some visual-novel (VN) sections. And then, you get some gameplay in-between. The animations are very cinematic and well made, they really are the highlight of the story! But the gameplay sections seem a bit too small and sparse when compared to the VN scenes, specially in the beginning. Those scenes are still engaging, and there is some filler, but not enough to be annoying. However, I still wish there was some more gameplay in the early game. The missions aren't always to get to 1st place, which is cool. Sometimes the goal is to wreck a specific characeter during the race, or do something else that the story is asking for. The 15 playable characters are divided in 5 teams of 3 people ([spoiler]but later, you can unlock one more team[/spoiler]). Each individual character has their own motivations, personality, backstory and rivals, even within the same team. The story will introduce these characters and their connections and backstories at a nice pace. The main focus is on the drama between these characters, and it's not some family-friendly drama about who wants to win the tournment, this is all about anger, revenge and even [spoiler]death and murder[/spoiler]. But there is also this bigger threat that they have to worry about, and it gets crazy... like... [spoiler]aliens[/spoiler] level of crazy, which is insane for a car game. It's goofy and over-the-top, but I love it, and the rivalries between the characters are super engaging too. The variety in these characters is also pretty cool. It's amazing that the animations and VN scenes are all fully voice-acted, in each character's own languages! The voice acting is amazing, and the fact that it's not all dubbed to English gives it some charm. This game is also not family-friendly at all, with a ton of swearing (seriously, the Irish lady says the f-word every two sentences) and some blood. But this is also kinda refreshing to see, after to many friendly festival racing games. [b]‣ GAMEPLAY & MECHANICS[/b] Disclaimer: I played with keyboard, don't judge. This game controls great, once you get used to how each car handles. I used the A and D keys to control my drifting, while using arrow keys for movement. But regular movement will not be enough with how fast paced this game is, you will have to drift! And man, is it fun to drift in this game, even if you're bad at it. There are some settings you can adjust to make the game more assessible to your control preferences, but some mechanics are part of the core gameplay, and you can't turn them off. For example, I always play racing games with automatic gear shifts, but Screamer doesn't have this option. Instead, you have a semi-automatic gear shifting mechanic, which sounds weird at first, but it's very gun and useful, and adds a lot to the gameplay. Shifting down is always automatic, but if you input a shift up in the right timing, you'll get a small burst of speed, and some of your boost meter will be filled. This adds a really cool layer of gameplay. You must also hold your boost button to use it, and release it at the right time to get an extra powerful and longer boost. There is also a strike meter, which allows you to use a short but stronger boost that can KO enemies (they'll come back though, for reasons explained in the story). There are even more mechanics, such as the shield and overdrive, but those aren't used as often, so I'll let you figure them out on your own. Each character also has their special passive ability, that is usually related to how they gain or use their boosts and strikes. [b]‣ OTHER STUFF & CONCLUSION[/b] There's an in-game gallery where you can unlock some concept art, the game's music, some other pictures and even all the CG animations, which is very cool. The game usually runs fine on max graphics, but it did skip some frames very rarely. The multiplayer seems to not function very well. Most people complain that it barely works, and, from my experience, it definitly didn't work, I couldn't get into a single match. But hey, there are arcade races against bots, a whole story mode and even local split-screen! There is no free roam, which isn't a bad thing, I don't think this game needs a free roam mode, but I expected some ways to explore a little more for the price they're asking for it. Even then, I think it was worth paying full price for this, because the game is amazing, and I wanted to support a new type of racing game that strays away from the family-friendly car games with barely any story.

MILESTONE HAZ UNA SECUELA Y MI ALMA ES TUYA

As a kid of the 2000s, Screamer might just be the best racing game I've played since the original Forza Horizon. In a world of sim racers, we finally have a modern arcade racer that holds it own weight and then some. Great tense gameplay is joined by a campy, yet engaging story, and one of the greatest soundtracks in gaming history. Milestone, the developer, knocked it out of the park, and I hope they make a sequel. That sequel could hopefully improve on the games few flaws. The story, while fine, plays it safe at times, additionally, seeing as how the entire game is a racing competition akin to Speed Racer or Hot Wheels Highway 35, some kind of leaderboard and constant knowledge of standing in the story mode would have been a great addition. The car customization also seems to be locked behind the multiplayer modes exclusively, which is a massive disappointment. Overall, this game is a super solid 8/10 and will definitely sit within my top 5 games played in 2026.

The racing is alright, and the music is good, the visuals aren't special, but it is fun. The AI rubber-band super hard, can be a bit brain dead at times, or just impossible to catch up to depending on if it wants to. The double steering input stuff is odd, but doesn't take long to get use to. Some of the cars are neatly designed and their alternative part styles look better than the base designs. I feel like this game is early access still due to how the character models generally don't take up much of the screen and they all kind of just sit over a flat image to chat like most visual novels. Posing and shading felt lacking in a good number of dialogues. Feel a lot of them could have been animated into a cut-scene, while others they could have just had as race banter instead of two people talking in random locations. Watching the trailer, I felt the game had more animated cut scenes than it ended up having. A lot of the story or whatever scraps they give you feels rather brushed aside. A lot of people in the game randomly bring up they are gay (or at least bi) and it seems like it wants to put those ahead of the main plot. There are so many people in this who end up dragging up their gayness as a plot point instead of focusing on the death racing. You can't help but think "Is literally everyone in this gay?" Less "romance" focus and more on the racing stuff would have felt better. Shocked there isn't a tag of LGBT+ on the game already with how it kept poking its head in the way of plot. I didn't get a racing game to do a time attack race to listen to a character going 'omg I shouldn't be distracted by the hyper-active latina!' As a Bi-person, I couldn't care less. Came into this expecting to be similar to Destruction Derby Arenas, but with an anime styling, a couple game modes, and a better plot. Only got the anime style. If they make more, I hope they focus more on their important plot points and gameplay over this strung together series of ideas. I miss playing arcade-racing games like this.

Developers of this clown shіt have never played a racing game in their lives. Abysmal.

I really like racing games, but to be honest, this is one of the most disappointing racing games I've ever played. I finished the game in challenging mode. Races are too repetitive, same tracks and also u cant use customized cars in story mode. Some story dialogues are way too meaningless. On top of that the pricing is absurd. Definitely not worth for 60 dollars. Might be fun playing w friends but other than that its a meh game. Story was okay though. The later parts of the story don't have subtitles, even though they're some of the most important scenes in the game. I tried to refund the game but it was too late.

Best arcade racer i've played in an decade.

One of the best, coolest and most fun arcade racing games I have played in years!!! It has everything you could possibly want from a classic arcade racer; unique fun-to-learn, hard-to-master mechanics and controls, spectacular visuals, a big and varied selection of (very well designed!) tracks, stupid(ly cool) car customization, an absolutely BANGING soundtrack, a great cast of characters with unique cars, an absurd story mode, split-screen multiplayer(!), secret routes, secret unlockables, boosts and attacks... I'm SO happy this game exists!!

Most boring racing game i ever played, repetitive af not worth it even in huge promos

That flow when u're going through the turns at full speed is priceless - After mastering: achievements in this game can be a lil grindy, but not too much if u know some tips