G.G Series: Drift Circuit

Genre: Top-Down Racing

Players: 1

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Review:

Drift Circuit is a Top-Down Racing game released on the Nintendo DSi via the DSiWare service in 2011 as well as being released on the Nintendo 3DS eShop. This game features gameplay similar to classics like R.C. Pro-Am and Off-Road, with players racing three competitors in a Top-Down race to try to beat them to the finish line.

The presentation this game uses is simple, but it works well enough, with decent 2D visuals and energetic synthesized music. Unfortunately, both the visuals and music are highly repetitive, making for an overall bland presentation.

The gameplay here is decent in theory, with players having to out-maneuver the other cars on the race track with the help of a “drift” turn that players can use by double-tapping. However, in practice, there are multiple issues here.

First, I should mention that this “drift” doesn’t really control like a drift at all, but as a tighter turn. I suppose this is all well and good, but the AI-controlled cars seem pretty dumb and lack any sort of personality. To make up for this, the game has to fudge the vehicles’ speed a bit to make this come across as a fair race – at the start of every race, the other vehicles will be inexplicably faster than you, but then throughout the rest of the race you’ll be the faster one (though still pretty slow – this game isn’t exactly a fast-paced racing game). As a result of this, your main task seems to be to do a good job taking turns as tightly as possible and to not crash into anything, including the other racers.

Once you realize this is all that’s needed, this game becomes a laughably easy matter to win time and again. I suppose it’s still enjoyable to do this, but it’s disappointing that this game has technically sound gameplay but had to jerry-rig a way for the AI-controlled opponents to present even the semblance of a challenging opposition. Of course, this problem could have been addressed by giving players a multiplayer mode to compete in, but as with all G.G Series games, this is purely a solo affair.

For its low $2 price tag, I suppose some may still find Drift Circuit to be an entertaining distraction between other games that at least justifies that low price. However, with the poor AI and lack of multiplayer, I can’t see this being a game that anyone is likely to play for very long before moving on.

tl;dr – Drift Circuit is a Top-Down Racing game where players use “drift” turns to outmaneuver opponents and try to finish first. The core gameplay here is decent, but it seems hobbled to try to make up for the poor enemy AI and lack of multiplayer play. For only $2, some may find this a worthwhile distraction, but I suspect most players will grow bored with it quickly.

Grade: C-

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