A racing game with Extreme in its name sounds cool but you know what sounds way cooler? Abbreviating Extreme to Xtreme to up the street cred factor to the max. Xtreme Club Racing even has “Xtreme” mad max looking cars to race with. What could go wrong with a premise like that? Well, a lot actually…
Downhill slope racing
When you first start Xtreme Club Racing your only option is to start the simulation. Once the simulation starts you are presented with what looks an unfinished version of the real game. Your car and all the objects look like 3D models which have not been coloured in yet. I understand the simulation effect they went for but the end result is a mush of lines where you can hardly make out anything useful on your screen. You start at the top of a slope and you need to reach the bottom within the time limit while collecting a pre-set amount of tokens. After being successful in the first race, 2 others follow which look and play exactly the same.
Once the simulation tracks are completed, the real Xtreme Club Racing madness unlocks. I say madness because it sure looks like somebody insane or at least with Xtreme mental problems decided to make this game. You get to choose a car but only one is available. The other 3 are unlocked by gaining experience once you complete tracks successfully. Only one area is available: Japan. It consists of 6 tracks which look more or less the same. Each track adds something else to the already existing mess. When everything is cluttered enough with hazardous objects and you can’t see where you are going, they turn off the lights.
Rinse and repeat
Being successful in Xtreme Club Racing comes down to reaching a high enough score. You and two other opponents battle towards the bottom. Getting higher in the ranking of course grants you a higher score. But when you are last you can still clear the track. Collecting stars, overtaking other cars or having enough seconds left when reaching the finish, all grant you points extra. Once you know when to go full throttle and when to hit the break, the tracks become easy to clear. While Xtreme Club Racing tries to mix things up with adding more stuff to hit towards your descend, it fails to offer any real challenge.
Upgradable vehicles
As mentioned, each track is filled with junk but among the junk, there are also coins to collect. These coins can be used to upgrade your vehicle’s nitro, speed, and handling. This mechanic is not balanced at all because after the first area I had enough coins to maximize each vehicle. It took me not long after to unlock the fastest car either. With still 3 areas of 6 tracks to go, this was surely not well thought out.
The 90s called and want their graphics back
The collision detection and the subsequent crashes are atrocious. The tracks themselves look horribly bad and extremely cheap. Conveniently the developers made the tracks in deep ditches to not have to bother with backgrounds too much. I’m sure they would’ve messed those up too so I can’t be to bothered about that. These graphics would fit a PS1 era game but in 2019, this is unforgivable. To top it off, look at this screenshot of a burning flame you get just before you get your score…
Conclusion
Xtreme Club Racing excels in being an extremely bad racing game you must avoid at all costs. This is a sorry excuse for a game.
