Speed Racer the movie is an orgiastic affair of lights, camera smears, and, well, speed. Speed Racer: The Video Game is all those things sans orgiastic—the game feels right but not so right it's wrong.
In Speed Racer there exists an enjoyable amalgamation of said license and fast, arcadey racers like F-Zero and Burnout: you drive and cross-check at speeds upwards of 330 MPH in vehicles commandeered by flamboyant leather-clad divas and divos alike. On paper it sounds awesome and in practice it mostly is, if only because of the fact that this game is for the Wii.
I mean I've said it before and I am sure I could say it again, but developers have a quaint disposition toward shoehorning lame Wii functionality onto shovelware. That's why Speed Racer is a trifle alarming. Stick this game on PS2 or 360 and it would probably be numbingly boring. But since all the steering is done by holding the remote sideways—or by placing it in a Wii Wheel—and tilting it, and all the action is performed by either jerking the controller up into the air to jump or from side to side to slam into rival cars, the game frankly gets kind of intense once you get into it.
Thankfully the developers allowed us enough time to stop and catch our breath: during any attacks against other cars, we switch to our "Car-Fu" mode (yes, that's what they call it) where time slows down and points for crushing enemies rack up as you send them careening to the edges of the track. You can even save up boost power to enter a massive meter-emptying mode called "The Zone," an homage to one of the film's final LSD-trip scenes where the screen goes all Lucy in the Sky and your racer accelerates to speeds far beyond the threshold of safety.
So in Speed Racer you race on crazy future tracks with crazy future people from the start to the finish. And really that is pretty much it: no fluff, no frills, just a Grand Prix (think Mario Kart but with more points for Car-Fu-ing all manner of sucker), a time trial, and a versus mode. But it's not really a bad thing—if you're the kind of user that's already going to be into Speed Racer you're probably going to want to race, and the Wii adaptation of the Wachowski brothers film about the American localization of the Japanese anime based on the original manga does indeed allow you to race, if little else. There aren't many different courses, no cinemas, no unlockables to speak of (just other drivers during your normal progression through the Grand Prix), no mini-games, trailers, or fancy heads-up displays. I would even say there's just enough entertainment here to last you the couple of days either pre- or post-views of the film. If you're not into Speed Racer the movie, you probably aren't reading this anyway.
Luckily enough, this title is roughly the only one of its kind available on the Wii right now, and for that it is granted a saving throw: grab a friend and another Wii Wheel just for kicks and you might have yourself a fine weekend afternoon or two. Just not one as orgiastic as the one the movie offers.
In Speed Racer there exists an enjoyable amalgamation of said license and fast, arcadey racers like F-Zero and Burnout: you drive and cross-check at speeds upwards of 330 MPH in vehicles commandeered by flamboyant leather-clad divas and divos alike. On paper it sounds awesome and in practice it mostly is, if only because of the fact that this game is for the Wii.
I mean I've said it before and I am sure I could say it again, but developers have a quaint disposition toward shoehorning lame Wii functionality onto shovelware. That's why Speed Racer is a trifle alarming. Stick this game on PS2 or 360 and it would probably be numbingly boring. But since all the steering is done by holding the remote sideways—or by placing it in a Wii Wheel—and tilting it, and all the action is performed by either jerking the controller up into the air to jump or from side to side to slam into rival cars, the game frankly gets kind of intense once you get into it.
Thankfully the developers allowed us enough time to stop and catch our breath: during any attacks against other cars, we switch to our "Car-Fu" mode (yes, that's what they call it) where time slows down and points for crushing enemies rack up as you send them careening to the edges of the track. You can even save up boost power to enter a massive meter-emptying mode called "The Zone," an homage to one of the film's final LSD-trip scenes where the screen goes all Lucy in the Sky and your racer accelerates to speeds far beyond the threshold of safety.
So in Speed Racer you race on crazy future tracks with crazy future people from the start to the finish. And really that is pretty much it: no fluff, no frills, just a Grand Prix (think Mario Kart but with more points for Car-Fu-ing all manner of sucker), a time trial, and a versus mode. But it's not really a bad thing—if you're the kind of user that's already going to be into Speed Racer you're probably going to want to race, and the Wii adaptation of the Wachowski brothers film about the American localization of the Japanese anime based on the original manga does indeed allow you to race, if little else. There aren't many different courses, no cinemas, no unlockables to speak of (just other drivers during your normal progression through the Grand Prix), no mini-games, trailers, or fancy heads-up displays. I would even say there's just enough entertainment here to last you the couple of days either pre- or post-views of the film. If you're not into Speed Racer the movie, you probably aren't reading this anyway.
Luckily enough, this title is roughly the only one of its kind available on the Wii right now, and for that it is granted a saving throw: grab a friend and another Wii Wheel just for kicks and you might have yourself a fine weekend afternoon or two. Just not one as orgiastic as the one the movie offers.