HOT WHEELS UNLEASHED™ 2 - Turbocharged

Review

Developed by Milestone, Hot Wheels Unleashed 2: Turbocharged is the brand new sequel to the 2021’s arcade racing title based on the internationally recognized toys license. The game features a dedicated single-player mode called Creature Rampage, in which you explore a map filled with races, events and rewards, which is really well polished. The story is narrated through short cutscenes made in a comic book art style with multiple characters talking and making silly jokes. Quite obviously, the story is aimed more at a younger audience, thus easily forgettable and skippable if all you want is to have fun driving. The Career mode also features challenging boss races and even if the story never takes itself seriously, it’s a good way to unlock unique rewards and upgrades for your vehicles. There are of course other modes such as Elimination and Drift Master. In the former, the player in the last position gets eliminated after some time, until only one remains. Drift Master is based on how many points you can obtain by drifting on corners. In addition to these, there are online modes that make you compete with other players through cross-play between PC, Xbox and PlayStation. You can even create your own custom tracks through a well-polished editor, and let other players try them. My suggestion is to avoid online multiplayer races in the beginning, because players with highly modified vehicles will likely win. Keep playing the single player content until you can upgrade your favorite tiny vehicles.

Gameplay-wise, driving controls are really smooth and fun. Keep in mind this is still an arcade racing game, so you will often drift, boost, jump and use different skills to reach the first place. You can also bump the cars close to you and push them off the track or towards obstacles. Starting the game, you will only have a small selection of available vehicles to choose from, but later on you can use the in-game currency obtained from winning races to unlock new vehicles from a selection of over 130 toy cars. There is great variety, including new motorbikes and ATVs that weren’t present in the previous game. They all have different types, maneuverability and stats, but you can also upgrade them through a basic skill tree and unlock new perks. You can customize all your vehicles through the Livery editor and the Sticker editor, adding stickers or other components and changing colors. You can even share your customized vehicles online and let other players download them.

Visually speaking, the game looks simply gorgeous. Not only is there a great level of detail in each tiny vehicle, but there is also a lot of detail in the gigantic environments that you always see in the background while driving. Moving from the Dinosaur Museum to the Mini Golf course, you can feel the different types of terrain (grass, sand, etc.) that directly affects your driving. There is great variety between each track, but the game probably needed three or four more environments to avoid that sense of repetition that usually arrives when you race for long hours. The PC version is also perfectly optimized and bug-free while the presence of Easy Anti Cheat should keep cheaters away for a while.

Overall, Hot Wheels Unleashed 2 perfectly represents the toy cars brand by delivering a solid and fun racing experience. It’s not Forza Horizon and doesn’t even want to be like it, which is great. I’m not sure that delivering a sequel so soon was the right idea, but it feels like a great “more of the same” (with minor additions) for anybody who enjoyed the first one. The game looks beautiful and hopefully will be long supported with new vehicles and tracks before being surpassed by another Unleashed sequel.

Review written by Sonic Punk for Zeepond.com

HOT WHEELS UNLEASHED™ 2 - Turbocharged Steam Store Page