Action racers?

[Umiri]

Simple question, IDK what exactly to call this kind of racing game, but in the PS3/360 era there was this brief trend of racing game where you raced on extreme conditions, natural disasters, exploding buildings that kind of stuff and I really only know 3 games, would like to know if there are more because I love them, the rest of the post will be just a summary of the 3 games I know.

Motorstorm Apocalypse

The 4th and final instalment in the Motorstorm franchise, which are post-apocalyptic off road arcade racers, this one set itself appart by having very action heavy tracks, where mid race there are events that act as hazards sometimes it’s stuff like helicopters opening fire at you, other times it’s more interesting stuff like buildings collapsing and you having to dodge the debree mid race, sometimes the track layout is altered, admittedly I haven’t played Pacific Rift, that might have done this too? But at least 1 and Arctic Edge definitely don’t do this.

FUEL

Another post apocalyptic off-road racer, this one set itself apart by taking place on a massive open world map, at the time only second to Daggerfall, the tech behind this one is pretty impressive and the developer Asobo kept refining it, you might have seen it on their other games The Crew and Microsoft Flight Simulator (The newest one), besides that the game is more chill, due to the open world the action events aren’t as drastic and environment changing as the other 2 games I’m talking about, but you do race in Hurricanes and forest fires and stuff like that, it’s fun but it’s so big that I kinda lost interest long before I was close to unlocking everything, also thanks to the DRM it’s a pain in the ass to get working on PC these days.

Split/Second

Finally, I saved the best for last, so Split/Second is kind off a standard arcade racer in the vein of something like burnout with the exception that you have power ups, what makes it special is that the power ups themselves aren’t stuff you shoot out of your car or boosts, instead they are things that you activate in the track, stuff like booby traps that drop things on other drivers, opening a shortcut (which can serve as a trap if other drivers follow you and don’t make it in time) or just something absolutely insane like causing a plane to crash in the track changing the whole layout due to the debris of the accident, or blowing up a building, stuff like that, it’s crazy, I love this game and it’s a shame that as far as I know there’s nothing else like it.

But anyways that’s it, if you know of similar stuff please post it, I’d love to hear about it and possibly check it out.

[AlienBob]

Split/Second is the obvious king of these games, but on a smaller scale may I nominate the FlatOut games? Particularly FlatOut2: Ultimate Destruction. By the third lap of any race there’s so much garbage littered on the track and the cars are all so beat up it’s wonderful. Also fun minigames and I think the game still looks good. The series was handed over to other developers after that and went straight into the toilet (I believe FlatOut 3 was the worst reviewed game on Steam for a while) and the actual successor is Wreckfest, which is still fun but lacks some of the goofy magic of the first games.

[Umiri]

I think I have Flatout 1, probably not hard to get 2, I’ll look for it to check it out, but how I wish there was more Split/Second, will never forget the first time I raced with an airplane falling on me.

[Grey]

Oh yeah, kind of a under supplied “genre” these days, at least with these more realistic/gritty games from around that time.

I tried getting Split/Second (Steam version) to run properly to play in local multi the other day and it just didn’t work. Don’t even remember which it was, think controllers weren’t properly detected, had some bad graphic/tech related problems (maybe fps locked to 30 or some nonsense). Really a shame as I never played it back in the day properly. If you have any tips or know fan patches to make it run well again let me know.

ReVolt comes to mind, rather normal racer plus powerups though. Still the only game I know of/played which nailed the RC car physics extremely well. Then there was Crashday, which even got kind of a remaster recently (2017) Crashday Redline Edition on Steam - comes from a time after Interstate ‘76 and other left a hole of Cars but with guns! games.

More in sync with the theme of the mentioned was nail'd on Steam , quad bike racing which was neat but also fairly normal otherwise. FlatOut 1/2 were great because they had these fun Throw Your Driver sports modes (censored in Germany!) Spent most likely more hours in those as the regular races which were just hard af. Really a shame those are gone from Wreckfest entirely.

And then there are of course bunch of more wild racing games but I think they’re not quite what you’re asking for, like Sonic Allstars Racing or of course Carmageddon series.

[AlienBob]

@Grey

FlatOut 1/2 were great because they had these fun Throw Your Driver sports modes (censored in Germany!)

Curious how these were censored. Was the character replaced by a dummy or were they just removed entirely?

[Umiri]

Oof, sorry about Split/Second not working, I have it on PS3 so I have no idea how to get it to run on PC.

But Re-Volt!
I loved that game, so good, I think I still have the GOG version from before it was de-listed because the dev stole code from a mod, fun game.

Ironically of the games you mentioned I think Sonic All Star Racing transformed does fit the bill, because the tracks tend to change from lap to lap.

[Grey]

@AlienBob

@Grey

FlatOut 1/2 were great because they had these fun Throw Your Driver sports modes (censored in Germany!)

Curious how these were censored. Was the character replaced by a dummy or were they just removed entirely?

Yeah Flatout just got a crash test dummy model instead of a human in the censored version. IIRC this was also only true for that mode, not regular races where you too could go out the windshield

[SMD]

I love Re-Volt! I just wish it was easier to play with a controller these days. I have it on Steam but maybe I could emulate the Dreamcast version?

[AlienBob]

Actually, speaking of Flat out, that developer also did Ridge Racer Unbounded, which, while it should never have been given the Ridge Racer name, is probably as close as we’ve ever gotten to a Split/Second 2.

Ridge Racer Unbounded PC - EPIC DESTRUCTION HD Gameplay max settings 1080p

[SeeroftheNight]

This genre you’re describing sounds like it has a lot of overlap with Combat Racers.

I’ve tried Wreckfest a few times and I never found the physics to be any fun, personally. However I later came across Trail Out, a russojank spiritual successor to the FlatOut series. If you can get behind a bit of jank and low budget storytelling (I’m fairly certain the main story, which is bad and doesn’t matter anyway, is voiced by two or three actors which voice filters for different characters) then it is a fun racer, especially the destructible environments.

As a child I played Demolition Racer: No Exit on Dreamcast, despite being far less known than it’s older Playstation/PC counterpart, it is WAY better, and seriously underrated. I highly recommend it.

[Umiri]

That really doesn’t look very Ridge Racer but it does have style and looks very fun, I’ll see if I can get a hold of it.

[Umiri]

Wo, Trail Out looks like exactly what I was looking for, it’s like a cross between FlatOut and Motorstorm Apocalypse, with the crashing and ragdoll mechanics of FlatOut and the ridiculous explosion filled environments of Motorstorm Apocalypse, thanks for showing that to me, I’m sure I’ll be able to get over the jank, but yeah I was looking for more stuff like that.

I’ll look up the Dreamcast game too then.

[SeeroftheNight]

I just looked it up, it’s on Steam for $2 right now. And yeah, it seems most of the negative reviews are that it isn’t much like other Ridge Racer games.

Also, hope you enjoy Trail Out!