Sideways Racing Review

Wednesday, June 8, 2011

Sideways Racing Review

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Sideways Racing Review

By Jennifer Allen on June 8th, 2011
Our Rating:

:: EXHILARATING
iPad Only App - Designed for the iPad

Classic top down racing with a techno punk vibe

Developer: Bjango
Price: $2.99
Version Reviewed: 1.0.1
Device Reviewed On: iPad 2

Graphics / Sound Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Game Controls Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Gameplay Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Replay Value Rating: 3.75 out of 5 stars

Overall Rating: 3.94 out of 5 stars

Racing games frequently fall into one of two camps – the sim and the arcade racer. Sideways Racing offers a very important clue in its name, providing players with the kind of racing action that’s more to do with sliding round corners quickly than carefully manoeuvring each track. Sideways Racing immediately harks back to the glory days of Micro Machines. It’s not quite as indepth but what is there provides a great experience.

Besides the basic training mode, there are 3 modes to get to grips with. The meat of the game comes in the form of the League mode offering 3 different areas to race in, comprising of 9 different tracks in all. It’s perhaps not as plentiful as some would like, not taking a huge amount of time to complete, however there is always the option of bumping up the difficulty level which provides a stronger challenge. Time Trial does exactly what the name suggests while Knockout is a form of Last Man Standng with cars competing to be the last one on the track by being first consistently.

Nitros and other bonuses are available to pick up as the player races around to boost the excitement as well as the speed involved. During some tracks when there are up to 10 cars racing at any one time, these power ups can really make the difference. There’s also the added problem of the car needing repairing if it clashes with too many opponents or walls. On the plus side, this works in the player’s favor as it’s possible to destroy their opponent in a similar way.

Controls are pretty responsive and accurate. On the left of the screen lies the accelerator and reverse buttons while the right controls direction. It’s possible to use either touch or swipe based controls, with touch controls being the most effective. It’s a shame that there aren’t any accelerometer based controls but the touch ones do the job well ensuring the game is rarely frustrating. The only frustration actually stems from the lack of a restart button during a race. If the player messes up in a race, there’s no way of simply restarting and trying again which can get annoying for such an arcade leaning title.

Sideways Racing makes for a great arcade racer. Harking back to the old days of top down racing is an excellent move and it makes Sideways Racing all the more endearing. GameCenter leaderboard support gives players all the more reason to replay too, trying to beat the week’s high score and so forth. It does make players eager for more tracks to be added in future updates though so fingers crossed for the developers to take note of that wish.