REVIEW – A free-to-play racing game full of untraceable currencies and Disney characters. If we drop the free-to-play element, we’ve seen something like it on PS1 with Walt Disney World Quest: Magical Racing Tour (developed by Crystal Dynamics), and it’s slightly better despite having fewer tracks and characters. Disney Speedstorm doesn’t have any newer characters either, but maybe it’s better that way.

Welcome to Disney Speedstorm! Drift into the ultimate hero-based combat racing game, set on high-speed circuits inspired by Disney and Pixar worlds. Master each character’s unique skills and claim victory in this thrilling arcade racing experience from the creators of the Asphalt series!

Mickey

Gameloft (which became Vivendi’s when the French media giant tried to buy Ubisoft) has chosen the more classic, or at least better-known, characters for the game. Still, the list will almost certainly be extended later, as a free-to-play game needs to have regular post-launch content. We have already learned what will be in the fifth and sixth seasons, as 17 more new characters will be added to Gameloft’s product. The characters have been slightly reworked in design, as they all have a somewhat figure-like, blocky look. Presumably, it was done to optimize for weaker devices, but it was unnecessary to use this style because it’s not attractive in most cases. If you’re not willing to pay (remember, the f2p model), then Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck will only be available for a long time. True, you can unlock multiple characters from multiple game modes. Still, unfortunately, there are MP coins, tokens, seasonal coins, and who knows how many other currencies, but almost certainly a number approaching EA Sports’ Ultimate Team.

Wouldn’t it make more sense to simplify microtransactions? Have one currency and a set value for it, and buy what you need with that. But it is possible to race without it, as your character can level up in single-player events. You can concentrate on one character this way (the one you choose is often different in ability). Still, if you were to step out into the online space, the scales would quickly tip against you in ranked tournaments if it wasn’t regulated that everyone was on the same level as you. Still, in the future, they will likely throw the current balance out the window to turn it into a pay-to-win thing. It’s competitive now. The gameplay brings the basics of Mario Kart: drifting gives you a boost, you can use weapons, and you can use your character’s ability (either by pressing the button or holding it down to deploy it in a slightly different way), giving you a bit more strategy to work with.

Donald

The tracks are not quite cookie-cutter, average concepts because they all have a theme to them, and in most cases, they use references to the material Gameloft has worked from. Some of them go back to the early years of Disney, so, of course, we get black-and-white competition. It’s an excellent idea, but then you can quickly forget about it because there are different routes on several tracks (the first thing that springs to mind is Sonic R on the SEGA Saturn…). There will also be blue rails to grind on (what is this, Tony Hawk? Again, DS mimics the Sonic franchise) for alternative routes. But the drivability is more like Sonic’s racing games (not Kinect’s Free Riders), so it’s a strange combination of Mario basics and Sonic style. Fortunately, the music hasn’t been wholly botched, as elements and themes from the franchises have been appropriately transposed in an electronic music style, albeit in many cases.

However, there are also many instances where the sound samples of the original songs have been appropriately adopted. That said, it might be a better idea to simply use the original songs (there will probably be a microtransaction for that because there was certainly not enough money in the coffers for that because of the royalties). The performance has not been mentioned yet, so it should be added that the frame rate (even on PlayStation 5) does drop noticeably when things are a bit chaotic. It might be different on a PC, but it depends on the configuration: someone with a nine-year-old machine will be lucky if it starts without overheating, and a relatively modern rig will have no problem.

Play something else instead

Disney Speedstorm gets a six-and-a-half out of ten, and then it can roll away because everything may seem fair for now. Still, they’ll do what Activision Blizzard did with Crash Team Racing: Nitro-Fueled (release at full price, no microtransactions, and then after the reviews for it got posted, whoops, microtransactions snuck into the game…). The experience may seem reasonable NOW, but in time, they’ll surely fill it with more microtransactions, and it’ll be such a pay-to-win experience that we’ll be heading towards uninstall in short order. Given the state of the gaming industry, it’s worth preparing for the worst.

-V-

Publisher: Gameloft

Developer: Gameloft

Style: competition

Release: September 28, 2023.
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