Does a racing game need to have a car, truck or motorcycle in it to be a racing game?
The development team at Sumo Newcastle would like to argue the case that it doesn’t – preferring clones of people instead of vehicles.
After all, DeathSprint 66 has all the hallmarks of a futuristic racer such as Redout 2 – and that space racer with flying craft falls within our desired subgenre.
There is a dystopian setting, boost pads, time and position-based events. You even use the gamepad triggers to accelerate and drift, and preceding the challenges is a lighting gantry.
Except, unlike Ridge Racer, there is more blood than a scene from The Shining.
In a nod to Stephen King’s alias Richard Bachman, author of The Running Man, in DeathSprint 66 ‘Bachman Media Network’ is hosting a vicious spectator sport.
Controlling (vicariously, so says the game’s background) a clone, read person, you must run through courses that include a litany of traps, spikes and lasers, all aiming to turn you into a mushy pulp. The implements are all a little Fifty Shades of Grey.
It’s your task to make it out alive, first and foremost. Then win. Online. Against seven other competitors.
For now, we’ll save the multiplayer for the September release. But, we did dabble in the freshly unveiled PVE single-player content.
The aesthetic reminds us of the Fury DLC for Wipeout HD, and so does the flow required for competitive times. You must react quicker than a housefly to avoid some of the obstacles, repetition your friend in learning the best routes.
One clumsy analogue stick movement can lead to sudden demise, but when you do manage to pull off a wall ride, followed by a rail grind, then straight into a surge (manually-activated boost system), the sensation is almost dream-like.
Once we had acclimatised to the basic controls, we were bit-by-bit introduced to new, ever-daring, mechanics.
Avoiding obstacles is more than a case of timing a jump – there will be times when bright red lasers need to be avoided by leaning out of the way like a Beat Saber session.
The events are distinct. Perhaps not a surprise when you consider that the Game Director Andrew Willans worked on the delightfully esoteric Driver San Francisco.
That translates to a mode where you run through rings. A clock is counting down, and each ring extends the time, analogous to Sega Rally. Except, here your head explodes should the timer reach zero.
Racing against AI-controlled rivals is frantic, and also, we presume, a helping hand to upskill yourself ahead of even more frenetic online battles.
By the time buzzsaws and proximity mines were present, it is safe to say, we died. A lot. But so too did our opponents.
Some will see you wear a non-customised outfit dubbed the ‘suit of shame’ should you fail hard. That almost became our default look…
You do have abilities to combat rivals, too, such as a charge, or a defensive shield. The GIGA SAW acts like Mario Kart’s blue shell. Failing all of that, you’ll hopefully earn Hype to boost your Fame rank.
There is a lot going on. Once the sheen of the stylised world becomes the new normal, there were times when we found ourselves clumsily failing to wall-ride while simultaneously trying to avoid vaporising ourselves in a 2066’s equivalent of a blender – perhaps this was more down to our recalcitrant ageing reflexes than the game, however.
“I hope you leave enough room for my fist because I’m going to ram it into your stomach and break your god-damn spine,” screams Arnold Schwarzenegger in the film adaptation of Bachman’s tome.
He’s raging at Damon Killian, the doyen of a reality TV show where contestants face gladiatorial killers and fight to their death.
In many ways, playing DeathSprint 66 is like being on the receiving end of that rant. Painful. Violent. Aggressive.
Unlike the book and the movie, however, when you get it all together and pull off a race, the satisfaction level is akin to managing a complex move in Tony Hawks Pro Skater as a teenager. In other words, we’d like to come back for more.
DeathSprint 66 is set for a PC release on 12th September 2024, published by Secret Mode.
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