Hot Wheels Unleashed: Great racing fun in the universe of the toy line

I think I haven’t thought about Mattel’s Hot Wheels in decades, but I’m going to be circling September 30th this year. Hot wheels unleashed That day hits the market, and the arcade-style racer couldn’t be in better hands.

Milestone from Milan, known for tough, licensed racing simulations like Monster Energy Supercross 4 and the MotoGP franchise, get the chance to creatively stretch your legs with the die-cast collector’s cars, and they don’t waste the moment in a bit. A weekend with a preview version of Hot wheels unleashed has shown me exciting, balanced racing action over and over again. It’s not just a roll-out of kart racing tropes and power-ups in a Hot Wheels chassis. There’s enough variability on the track, in the vehicles, and the environment that surrounds everything to make Hot Wheels feel like it has a canon and you, the driver, are a part of it.

The routes are of course a second grader’s dream. Again, instead of sewing unnecessary corkscrews and Ferris wheel-sized loops together just for visual effects, the tracks I’ve ridden implemented such things with some sort of challenge or benefit in mind. The momentum in the corkscrew, for example, carries you into the curve instead of away – and there the route usually has no guardrail. A huge loop can result in a boost pad that multiplies your swing (and provides even more with a strategic use of turbo boost). It could also spit you into an unguarded hairpin bend, throw your toys off track, and plunge into the surrounding meta-environment.

The settings themselves play a big role Hot wheels unleashed‘s winning aesthetic. What I saw consisted of three different environments – a basement, a college building, a skyscraper under construction – and then through several pre-made courses. Some sections of the track briefly slipped over the bare ground or someone’s desk before they hit the plastic sheet again, for example. In the basement, a spider is a danger to the track, and its web becomes a kind of blue-shelled equalizer that switches off the leader. In the campus setting, I fell out of the “Applied Gravity” lane, and instead of spawning onto it, I just raced around on the floor, under stools, and out into the library. I fell from one part of the track to another a couple of times, but I don’t think it gave me any advantage on the shortcut. Still, karting perfectionists will inevitably be on the lookout for such things.

Image: Milestone / Mattel

All of this complements a vehicle fleet that showed 33 cars in the preview build, of which more than 60 were promised at launch. The cars have variable handling, speed and acceleration and then usually a thumb on the scale to either moderate raw performance or to help Total Disposal (a giant garbage packer) stay competitive. Drag racers like the Rodger Dodger, recognizable by their huge engine heads and cut-out bonnets, have a clutch crack start that wasn’t really explained, but took advantage of their acceleration. In return, they don’t have much of a turbo boost. Meanwhile, the Bump Around – literally a bumper car – has a very long, variable turbo boost that can be used to fend off the deep-set Twin Mill or the futuristic Exotique, both of which have speed and handling scores of 5 out of 6.

Milestone says it built the world’s cars on a 1: 1 scale – which explains why your cumulative drift distance is happily measured in inches. Their virtuoso details nail the surfaces, from the matt gray die-cast chrome of the exhaust manifolds to the pearlescent and metallic flake paintwork that is common on racing cars of the 1970s and 1980s. I have probably not bought Hot Wheels since visiting my grandmother in 1984, but the auto repair shop correctly names each model and series. Most were from the last decade, and some were platinum or other upgraded versions.

In a nutshell, with several snorting hours Hot wheels unleashed I didn’t feel totally wrong with any car, nor did I feel totally in the it with the best. The hazards on the track were subtle and dangerous enough to keep me from turning on autopilot even with the fastest cars in maximum handling. There have been plenty of crack-ups that involved physics more challenging than just downforce and drift – some had me grind a skateboard-style guardrail before falling into the MC Escher-like abyss of the skyscraper environment.

But even when I respawned twice, I still took third place with the Roller Toaster (an old van with a few slices of King Thin on its back). It has a speed rating of 1 out of 6 but the longest boost in the fleet. I think it’s great; Kids are likely to pick a favorite for looks, and it’s good that it can match whatever it is. And the more discerning adults will try to top it all with the unorthodox rides.

Hot wheels unleashed will be released on September 30th for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, Windows PC and Xbox One.