AiRace

Genre: Racing / Flight Simulator

Players: 1-6 Competitive (Local Wireless)

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Review:

AiRace is an aircraft Racing Game released on the Nintendo DSi via the DSiWare service in 2010, and later grandfathered into the Nintendo 3DS eShop when the Nintendo 3DS released. This game has players racing biplanes through canyons, caves, and corridors, making use of weapon pickups in much the same manner as a Kart Racing game… but in the air.

The presentation here is phenomenal, given the game’s age and the tiny 16MB size limitation of DSiWare games. While the game’s low-poly 3D environments may not impress by today’s standards, it’s still incredibly impressive what this game was able to squeeze out of its limited hardware at the time. This is backed by an energetic but forgettable soundtrack.

One of the other things that’s really impressive about AiRace is how this game makes excellent use of its airplane racing concept. The delightfully creative courses you fly through in AiRace have all sorts of twists, turns, and secret passages that would never be feasible in a car racing game that mainly needs to stick to the ground. Here, players can suddenly find themselves having to scale up the face of an underground waterfall to reach the top, or dive down to take advantage of a path cut close to the ground.

The game gives players multiple control options, including both touchscreen and gamepad controls, and while I wasn’t enamored with the default options, I found that changing a few settings resulted in something that felt natural for me.

My biggest complaint about this game is that there isn’t enough of a variety of courses, and players must not only play through the campaign to unlock these courses, but that campaign requires them to repeat the same ones multiple times.

However, while AiRace might be short on content, this is otherwise a truly exceptional racing game that’s fun, unique, sports outstanding level design, and impressive-for-its-time visuals. In my opinion, this is one of the best games in the DSiWare lineup, and one you should absolutely add to your Nintendo 3DS game library before the Nintendo 3DS eShop is pulled down in 2023 and this game is lost to time.

tl;dr – AiRace is a Racing Game and Flight Simulator that brings Kart Racing sensibilities to a game that has you speeding through caves and corridors in a biplane. The course design here is phenomenal and makes great use of the three-dimensional freedom the airplanes allow for. I just wish there were more of those courses. However, what’s here is outstanding – this is a highlight of the DSiWare lineup.

Grade: A-

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