Snow Moto Racing Freedom

Genre: Snowmobile Racing

Players: 1-4 Competitive (Local Split-Screen, Online)

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Review:

Snow Moto Racing Freedom is a Snowmobile Racing game, with some races taking place in more open areas with gates to pass through, and other areas confined to a track. Much as with this developer’s other game Aqua Moto Racing Utopia, players are challenged to do tricks to fill up a boost meter, in a manner similar to the SSX games.

The good news is, unlike the system in Aqua Moto, this time around players are not locked into all-or-nothing boosts, making for a much more dynamic integration of tricks into the racing. Doing tricks in this game is also a lot more forgiving than in Aqua Moto… too forgiving, actually. I found that I had to actually try to land on a trick to be forced to bail in this game, which made the races feel less about skill and more about managing the game’s major flaw (which I’ll get to in a bit).

Despite the “freedom” in the name, you don’t really get true freedom in this game’s races. The use of gates in the open areas requires players to go through specific points, and the “Snowcross” race tracks don’t let you wander more than a few feet off the track before warping you back (with little in the way of a penalty). I wish this game actually did embrace the “freedom” in the title, as it would have been nice to just have a starting point and an end point, and let the player have free reign to decide their path. However, that’s not the game’s major flaw.

The major flaw this game makes players contend with is its horrible, horrible framerates. Right from the start, this game is a stuttering slide show. The four-player splitscreen is damn near unplayable, but even in single-player, this game’s framerates make playing it a chore.

The sad thing is, these terrible framerates are in service of… nothing particularly noteworthy in the graphics department. The riders and vehicles don’t look noteworthy, the trails vehicles leave in snow are pretty fake-looking, and the locales occasionally look good, but are generally pretty lackluster.

Oh, and one other final note. This game is selling for $40 on the Nintendo eShop, three times the price of the PlayStation 4 version of the game. Given how broken the game is on the Nintendo Switch, this is little more than pure, unbridled contempt

If it wasn’t for the horrible framerates, Snow Moto Racing Freedom would be a fair to decent racing game. Nothing special, but not bad. However, with the framerates being some of the worst I’ve seen in any game on the Switch, and with a price that would be laughable if it wasn’t infuriating, this is a game you’ll want to skip.

tl;dr – Snow Moto Racing Freedom is a Snowmobile Racing game that has players doing stunts to fuel a boost meter, with some races in open areas that require going through gates, while others are on a closed track. It’s mostly pretty average, other than the fact that the framerates in this game are some of the worst I’ve seen in any game on the Switch. And the price gouging in the Nintendo Switch version is simply inexcusable. Do yourself a favor and skip this one.

Grade: D-

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