The days when Nintendo and SEGA competed with each other in the console market are long gone, but the advertising campaign for Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds decided to bring them back.

In public appearances and commercials, SEGA has repeatedly compared its project to Mario Kart World — saying that the game is available on more platforms, supports cross-play, and offers classic karting gameplay without attempting to add an open world.

Of course, it’s pointless to compete with the ‘Big N’ in terms of sales — almost every Switch 2 owner has bought Mario Kart World. However, in terms of gameplay, Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds is a success — it will appeal not only to those who were disappointed by Nintendo’s latest racing arcade game, but also to fans of the genre who want something similar and relevant on PC and home consoles.

Nothing superfluous

They really didn’t experiment with the format — there is no open world, and initially only one Grand Prix championship is available, after which the rest of the modes are unlocked.

The Grand Prix includes four races — the first three take place at three unrelated locations, and for the final, the regions are brought together to test the knowledge gained on the tracks. The winner is determined by the points earned in each race — with extra points awarded for first place in the fourth race.

There are many new games here – online casino for real money in the US

Each race consists of three laps, and the most interesting one is always the second. It is here that the worlds from the game’s title switch — when you reach the finish line for the first time, you drive into a portal and are transported to a completely different region. From a winter location with a blizzard, you can teleport to a museum with rare cars, from a steampunk-style city to a jungle with walking dinosaurs. There are 15 parallel worlds in total, which are randomly selected from a common pool each time, so even in the case of the same Grand Prix, the races will differ due to the changing second lap.

Visually, the mechanics are not as well implemented as, for example, in Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart — when you approach a portal to another world, you see a poor-quality image of it, and the transfer occurs with a short flash. But in terms of gameplay, the portals work wonderfully: the car’s speed is not reduced, the direction does not change, and you can escape from flying enemy objects if you teleport to another location in time.

Thanks to the portals, the races seem very fast, despite the three laps, plus the first and third laps are not identical — by the end of the race, the conditions change slightly, new obstacles appear or old ones transform.

At the same time, it seemed to me that CrossWorlds lacks truly cool and unusual tracks that would be memorable after long sessions. There are almost no boring or unsuccessful locations — some turned out to be bright and colourful, such as Roulette Road in the style of a fairy-tale casino and the Mysterious Jungle, inspired by the region of the same name from Sonic Forces. Some are simply cute and atmospheric, such as the Apotos track with its Greek architecture and Ocean View, which wanders from one Sonic racing game to another. 

But there are no tracks that make you gasp at their impressive design, as is the case with Rainbow Road in Mario Kart. All regions are equally good — none stands out from the others.

However, there is nothing wrong with that if the gameplay is exciting on any track — and that is exactly what it is in CrossWorlds. The controls are simple and intuitive, but you need to get used to them by actively using all the mechanics. 

Many of them are related to acceleration — in particular, when entering a turn, you should hold down the drift button to build up charge, and the higher the level, the faster the character will accelerate. But this is true for situations where the character is driving on the road, and on the tracks here, this is not always the case — sometimes the vehicle turns into an aeroplane or a boat. 

And on water, for example, there is no drift in the usual sense — by holding down the same button, you prepare for a jump, which you can use to jump into acceleration rings or collect coins hanging in the air.