Kartoon Racing: Singleplayer Multiplayer Racing

Genre: Racing

Players: 1-8 Competitive (Online)

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Review:

Kartoon Racing is a stock car-style Racing Game released in 2022 on Nintendo Switch. And… I try to keep these opening paragraphs positive, so I suppose I’ll end the description there.

While Kartoon Racing doesn’t really look like a cartoon, its 3D visuals do feature some very light cel shading, with decent but unimpressive sound effects and no music. While not graphically impressive, Kartoon Racing mostly looks fine… until it starts moving. Simply put, this game has absolutely atrocious slowdown, particularly when more than a few cars bunch up together, the sort of situation that usually calls for a clearer and fast response to the action. In other words, this game’s performance routinely tanks at the absolute worst times.

The terrible performance is already enough to ruin the gameplay of Kartoon Racers, but just to make sure, this game makes braking absurdly ineffectual, to the point where you could start braking a massive distance away from a turn and still speed right into the corner anyway. It’s not like this is a flaw only you are subject to, either – frequently at turns you’ll see computer-controlled racers plow into corners in a way that makes them a pile-up that would be hilarious if it wasn’t so frustrating.

To make things even more absurd, there’s no discernable difference between driving on asphalt and driving on grass, except in some areas you’ll be forced to respawn on the road if you stray too far into the grass. Also, traffic cones are apparently bolted into the ground and will stop you cold as if they were a security barrier.

Kartoon Racing has the odd distinction of having repeatedly gone on sale, and not just for the bottom-of-the-barrel $2 price, but for well under $1. Even so, I cannot recommend this game. The terrible performance issues and the horribly busted game mechanics. If you’re really that desperate for a cheap Racing game, you have better free-to-play options. Don’t buy this, even for under $1.

tl;dr – Kartoon Racing is a stock car Racing Game that suffers from horrible game-wrecking slowdown, terrible game physics that make braking nearly impossible, and a few other issues that make this an abysmal Racing Game. Don’t buy this.

Grade: F

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