Racing games occupy a special place in the gaming community and my heart. The gameplay loop of grinding for XP or searching for powerful new weapons to defeat your many enemies is replaced with the simple adrenaline high of flying fast down the raceway. While it’s inherently built into the concept of racing, the competitive nature of these games hardly ever feels as toxic as many other player vs. player titles. While Hot Wheels Unleashed 2 – Turbocharged might scale the races down to fit in your backyard, they are no less thrilling, and the amount of content available in the game is absolutely massive.
Hot Wheels Unleashed 2 – Turbocharged has several means of grabbing your attention, but the main attractions are, without a doubt, the Multiplayer and Career modes. Seeing as I got my hands on the game early, I spent most of my time in Career. I didn’t have the pleasure of playing the game that came before this sequel, so I wasn’t familiar with the characters, but the plot is pretty straightforward (if a bit wacky.)
A professor has accidentally turned several normal-sized creatures into giant monsters using experimental technology. To stop them, you’ll have to shrink them down and battle them while on the same level. The reason for this is that the shrinking process is temporary, while the growing stage is permanent, meaning the good prof can’t just return the creatures to normal size.
Okay, in hindsight, simple isn’t exactly what I’d call the plot. Calling it a bit convoluted is far more accurate. I found myself with plenty of questions, like why we don’t just shrink the monsters down and step on them, for example, but the plot of Career Mode really isn’t what matters. This is a Hot Wheels game, and you’re here for the myriad of races that lead up to these monster encounters.
Career mode sees you taking on a host of different races and track challenges. It’s a great way to both get used to racing and earn some in-game cash. We’ll cover the cash later in this review, but first, I want to talk about the game’s controls.
Racing in this game feels phenomenal, and the controls are excellent, even on keyboard and mouse – something I can’t say for the majority of driving in games, even ones where driving is all you do. In addition to standard acceleration and turning, you have a resource bar for everything from boosting to jumping to side-swiping other cars off the track. Notably, there doesn’t seem to be any real braking, which is instead replaced by a button used to drift. Drifting is challenging to master and is one of your biggest sources of speed in a race.
Each race takes place on Hot Wheels plastic tracks, which swerve and loop-de-loop through backyards, museums, arcades, and more. Instead of crashing, you can fly, slide, or get knocked off certain parts of the track, forcing you to be placed back at the last checkpoint you passed. Your ability to control your car will be significantly challenged when parts of the race take place off the plastic track pieces, where dirt and a lack of barring on the sides of the road change up your approach.
The game features a phenomenal track editor, allowing you to use the modular pieces of the Hot Wheels tracks to make your own custom races. The track editor is one of the more complex ones I’ve seen, with so many nuances to track placement that I found myself getting a bit confused trying to understand everything. Once you’ve made a track you enjoy, you can test it out and then upload it online for other players to race on.
You earn rewards such as skill points and in-game currency when you race. This currency can be used almost exclusively to buy new cars. This is done with a rotating shop system where over 130 actual Hot Wheels toy cars (bikes or monster trucks) are available, each with its own stats, classification, and rarity. I lucked out and got Kit from Knight Rider in my first shop. Unless that’s the default, but I like to imagine I was just lucky.
Later, I also pulled one of the cars from The Fast and The Furious. I’ve never actually seen the series, so I don’t know the significance of this pull, but the car was ranked legendary and looks really cool.
The almost ‘gacha-like’ shop rotation isn’t my favorite aspect of the game, and I prefer just to be able to buy any car I’d like right off the bat. This is done to make collecting a bit more difficult and make the rarity of the cars mean something. Thankfully, the shop can be refreshed anytime using in-game currency. At the time of writing, there are no micro-transactions or loot boxes to capitalize on the rareness of cars, and the currency that can only be earned through racing is pretty generously rewarded.
In-game currency can then be used to upgrade your favorite cars. There are two tiers of upgrades, each being more expensive than the last—unlocking new perks and more slots on your car to equip them. You use skill points to unlock these perks, which give certain benefits and drawbacks to your car. I got my Kit fully upgraded and loaded out right away.
Personally, I found it a little disappointing that perks came with drawbacks. I want my hard-earned skill points to feel impactful and give me an edge over the other racers. I understand, however, why they aren’t straight buffs, as that could make racing a bit imbalanced, making winning a race an impossible task for new racers or new cars. Even with a fully upgraded Kit, I was still being challenged for every inch of track, even by the AI racers.
The Final Word
Hot Wheels Unleashed 2 – Turbocharged gives players the adrenaline rush of a high-speed race paired with the wackiness and freedom of a toy car track. An absolutely massive collection of cars and customization options means there’s always something to work towards in this game, and an expansive level editor means multiplayer races are always interesting. Real-life Hot Wheels collectors and racing game fans alike have something exciting in store with this brand-new, high-octane title.
9
Try Hard Guides was provided with a PC review copy of this game. Find more detailed looks at popular and upcoming titles in the Game Reviews section of our website! Hot Wheels Unleashed 2 – Turbocharged is available on Steam, Epic Games, PlayStation, Xbox and Nintendo Switch.