I feel like, nowadays, the vast majority of racing games I tackle at WayTooManyGames are either simulation-heavy or are open world titles such as Forza Horizon or the newest entry in the Test Drive Unlimited series (as much as I’d like to forget about it). Sometimes, all I want to play is a very simple, straight-to-the-point, arcadey racer. I don’t always want to eat a filet mignon; sometimes what I want is a neat little burger. If the burger is made with extra care, love, and is well-presented, that’s even better. Ergo, let me talk about this exact kind of burger. Let’s talk about Victory Heat Rally, a small indie racer that dropped into my lap like a delightful breath of fresh air.

Victory Heat Rally is a neat little racing game that features two obvious selling points: its presentation and its gameplay. Let’s start with the former. As you can clearly notice, it aims for a retro aesthetic, with a ton of sprites thrown into a 3D environment. Don’t think this is your run-of-the-mill Mode 7-esque carbon copy, however. The game is clearly polygonal, with each racetrack being carefully crafted with polygons, cliffs, elevations, and geometry. The spritework is added on top of it all to add a retro-ish sense of charm.

And boy, does it work. The game is colorful, creative, and it also runs at a magnificent framerate. Granted, it’s not the kind of game meant to push any hardware to its limits (not anything released after 2012, that is), but the performance was spectular, the loading times were near nonexistent, and track design was colored and varied enough, despite the self-imposed limitations. Never did the game struggle to render whatever mess was happening onscreen, even when all twelve cars, tons of assets, and some explosions were part of scenery.

The second selling point is the gameplay. Victory Heat Rally is all about an arcadey feel and drifting. Lots and lots and lots of driting. In essence, the game wants you to continuously drift in order to activate a booster in your car. This is not unlike Mario Kart when you think about it, but the boosts in question are a lot more potent. When you get a hold of the drifting system, which is actually quite easy to learn AND master, you’ll be blasting through each course with ease. This is not a hard game in any sense of the word. Even on later levels, things felt pretty easygoing. To be honest, I liked that.

You’ll spend most of your time in Victory Heat Rally‘s lenghty career mode. That is partially due to its length, as well as the sheer amount of stuff you can unlock via it, and also partially due to the fact the game doesn’t exactly feature a lot of other modes. If you want to play a quick race or race against the clock, by all means, have at it. There’s also splitscreen multiplayer, but that’s basically it. No online functionality, either. Stick to the career mode, as there is quite a lot of stuff to keep you busy for a while.

If there is one issue to point out, I’d say that the game’s sound design disappointed me. Not only was the soundtrack somewhat unspectacular, but I was surprised to find out there were no sound effects coming out of my car, at all. Having a racing game without any car sound effects during a race, just some repetitive tunes in the background, was certainly a choice. A really bad choice, mind you, but a choice nonetheless, I suppose. The only sound effect, out of very few out there, that managed to grab my attention, was a terribly compressed and borderline amateurish scream which would be played whenever an opposing car exploded. Like a much less funny Wilhelm Scream.

All in all, Victory Heat Rally suffers from a handful of issues, but what really matters is that it is a really fun and easygoing arcade racer. It’s not exactly meant to make you think very hard: just pick a course, pick a racer, and have at it with its intuitive drifting controls and adorable graphics. There isn’t too much of a reason to continue playing after the career mode is done, but it’s worth a shot regardless, especially if you can play it on the Switch or a device like the Steam Deck.

Graphics: 9.0 A gorgeous game which masterfully mixes sprite scaling with simple, but charming polygons. It looks retro, but also fresh at the same time. It also runs incredibly smoothly.	Gameplay: 8.0 Not exactly the most complex racing control scheme, and I guess that’s for the best. Once you get a hold of the drifting mechanics, you’ve basically mastered the game’s entire loop, but it still feels rewarding.
Sound: 5.5 Having a racing game without any car sound effects during a race, just some repetitive tunes in the background, was certainly a choice. A really bad choice, but a choice nonetheless, I guess…	Fun Factor: 7.5 Victory Heat Rally feels amazing at first, but loses some steam after a while. Nevertheless, there is a ton of content to unlock, and its career mode is lengthy. There isn’t too much of a reason to continue playing after the career mode is done, but it’s worth a shot regardless, especially if you can play it in a portable device.
Final Verdict: 8.0

Victory Heat Rally is available now on PC and Switch

Reviewed on Intel i7-12700H, 16GB RAM, RTX 3060 6GB.

A copy of Victory Heat Rally was provided by the publisher.