[gameinfo title=”Game Info” game_name=”” developers=”Digital Reality Software” publishers=”Digital Reality Software” platforms=”” genres=”” release_date=”June 6, 2012″]
Bang Bang Racing, originally released for Tegra based Android devices May 2011, has finally made its way to XBLA, PSN, and PC. Todays racing games are played from many perspectives like behind the wheel, and various levels of behind the bumper. The developers, Playbox and Digital Reality, said screw the new fangled style of racing and decided to go back over 20 years to a popular style from the eighties that was the top down racer. The top down viewpoint was used in many titles during the period due to hardware limitations causing them to look better than their behind the car counterparts. Does Bang Bang Racing bring back an old perspective and create something fresh or are do we have something that should have stayed dead and buried in the past?
Bang Bang Racing is a lot like classic titles R.C. Pro-Am and Off Road. The isometric top down view gives a greater view of the track and opposition. The downside is that the view also makes you feel less like you are driving a car and more like you are wiggling an object along a route ala the board game Operation. The cars themselves handle as you would expect with gas and braking which leaves that board game feeling entirely in the view of the action. The gameplay stays simple to keep it inline with the mentioned top down classics. Cars handled with tight controls and making laps around tracks. These tracks may contain road hazards like traffic cones and oil spills; the hazards have the appropriate effect on your car of slowing down or sliding.
Bang Bang Racing has a plethora of unlockable cars and paint jobs via the single player career mode. Career mode contains 4 classes to match the 4 classes of car and you complete different race types such as Standard, Elimination, & Time Trials. At the end of a class, there is a tournament of 5 races. Cars are unlocked after completing races and different paint jobs are unlocked on how you perform. The AI in career is a bit spastic. You can wreck and still lead the whole race or race perfectly and never get the lead. It feels like a bit of a crapshoot and will leave players having to play races multiple times to win. Content unlocked in career is usable in the split screen multiplayer mode which allows up to 4 players to set up races and tournament mode which is much like what you face at the end of each class in career. Bang Bang Racing is strangely missing online multiplayer but that is probably due to the roots of the game on Android.
Score: 7/10
Bang Bang Racing is a game that calls back to racing games from a forlorn era of limited processing power. Unfortunately a lack of online multiplayer and old school simplicity leave Bang Bang Racing feeling like it lacks substance when compared to today’s titles. Those nostalgic for the gameplay will enjoy the title while the rest of the players will wonder why.
