Gear.Club Unlimited 3 was unveiled back in May and slated for PC and consoles with a late 2025 release window.
However, PC, PlayStation and Xbox players will be waiting longer. At Gamescom, publisher Nacon confirmed that Gear.Club Unlimited 3 will still launch later this year, but as a timed Nintendo Switch 2 exclusive.
No platform has a specific release date yet, but Nacon is targeting a winter release window for the Switch 2 version.
This follows a similar precedent to the last game, with Gear Club.Unlimited 2 initially releasing on the Nintendo Switch before being ported to PlayStation and Xbox later.
Developer Eden Games describes the third entry as the “only realistic car game proposed on the Switch,” though it adopts an accessible driving model that leans closer to arcade, with 42 licensed cars at launch and an array of customisation options from bodykits to spoilers.
Not every car will be customisable however, due to licensing restrictions from manufacturers like McLaren and Bugatti.
As with previous games in the series, you can create spaces for displaying your car collection and building upgrade facilities, from paint workshops to performance upgrade shops.
Alongside a free play mode, the game features a story mode with characters, cut scenes and road races set in the French Riviera and, as you progress through the story mode, Japan.
Although races with AI take place on picturesque roads in Southern France and Japan, there is no traffic in the story or free play modes.
That’s not the case in the new Highway mode, however, where near misses with traffic tops up your score bar. If it gets too low, it’s game over.
This mode can also be played in a split-screen duel mode with two players competing for the highest score. In the Japan location, the narrow night-time highways were reminiscent of Tokyo Xtreme Racer.
Before KT Racing took over development, Eden Games helmed the first two Test Drive Unlimited games. The DNA of those games shines through Gear.Club Unlimited 3, with interactive dealerships and authentic manufacturer options when buying a car.
However, unlike Test Drive Unlimited, this is a smaller scale game with no open world or free roaming elements.
“There is a DNA in the sense that it’s making games about car love and not racing. It’s a very different approach’, explained Benoit Gomes, Creative Director at Eden Games.
“We want the player to have a reason to drive,” he continues, referring to the story mode, which will feature over 10 characters.
“It’s not a story about you as a driver, it’s a story about you and the Gear Club as a team, as a club. It’s about a love of cars and friendships – it’s not about rivalry. ”
From our brief playthrough, the Switch 2 version was marred with low-resolution textures and a choppy frame rate, but it’s worth noting the build we played is still work in progress.
This was not the case on PC, which is targeting 60fps. We suspect these blemishes will be less noticeable on a smaller screen in handheld mode, but we could only try it in docked mode.
Considering there is a lack of exclusive driving games with real-world cars on the platform, Gear.Club Unlimited 3 could be an enticing proposition for Switch 2 players, but it needs more polish at this stage.
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