Clutch was quite the surprise announcement, one I wasn’t expecting to see at the show at all. Considering the team just announced the game two days before Summer Game Fest, I figured it wouldn’t be there. To my surprise we got an invite to a hour long, hands-off demo of the game. Of course, I had to see more about this narrative-driven racing game!

Clutch is developed by Maverick Games, which was created by a team of ex-Playground Games developers who worked on the Forza Horizon series. They are aiming to make a cinematic, open-world action-driving game that takes you through the life of Theo Martial (played by Tosin Col) and Cass Martial (Little Simz). Theo is a heroic driver in the R1K – a historical series for the world’s top drivers – who finds himself in underground racing called the Midnight Collective after some close calls and bad decisions were made within the R1K.

Meet Theo and Cass, siblings, and at times, rivals.

The hands-off demo that was played for us went through the prologue that showed the siblings as kids growing up in foster homes. Funnily enough, the young version of Theo Martial is voiced by the son of Mike Brown, the CEO of Maverick Games. It showed us glimpses of them growing up and racing in the R1K, and the incident that pushed Theo away from these sanctioned races. Then, eventually, Theo gets to a point where he need a “fixer” to help get back into the racing career again, but it comes with a cost. Infiltrating a penthouse and stealing a very expensive car.

I will say, I was pretty skeptical about an open-world racing game that is trying to be so cinematic, but I was captivated by these characters. I wanted to see more of them and how they are pulled between the R1K and the Midnight Collective. It helps that the character models are extremely well rendered, and the acting is very good. The tension between the dad – who grew up as an R1K racer and is now Theo’s coach – and the current choices that Theo are making is well done and believable from the actors. All and all, they seem to be nailing the cinematic aspects of the title, but it remains to be seen how well that will be paced and spread out. I did ask how failure state would play out in Clutch: if finishing second or third in races would change certain outcomes. But it seems like it will be just a retry system if you don’t hit the requirements.

The R1K plays a huge part in the story and will feature plenty of races for the player.

All that can be top notch, but Clutch is a racing game at the end of the day, so let’s talk about its racing. It should come to no one’s surprise that it looks and behaves a lot like Forza Horizon. Now, they did mention that they have a very custom driving system for this game, with dynamic weather, puddles that effect the traction and the whole nine. Customization is also very important to them, because, come to find out, this isn’t a single player only game. I just assumed it was based off the focus on cinematic narrative, but you know what assuming makes me.

Clutch is also a shared world racer as well as having online races. They want to have car meet ups to show off your awesome car customizations as well. However, everyone is still technically Theo Martial since there isn’t a character creator, so it’s like some crazy dimensional meet ups of Theos from different timelines. You can challenge the other racers to events in the open world, and they showed us a couple that were interesting.

There will be a Police Wanted system. Think Need for Speed.

Of course, there was the standard track racing of the R1K, or just any normal lap or checkpoint race, but the other race was more unique. It’s about style and followers. Underground races are basically broadcasted online and the more cool stuff you do the more followers, likes, and viewers you will get. Doing more stunts like drifting, near misses, air time etc. is more important than hitting the checkpoint flags. So much so that you don’t even technically need to go through them, and there isn’t a penalty for missing them either. This means if there is a sick drift or jump you can take that would be out of the checkpoint flags, then it might be better to do that than staying on the road. Getting to the finish line first doesn’t mean you will actually win first place if you didn’t do anything to get points.

Another aspect that caught my eye is being able to unlock and equip various tools and gadgets to the car. In the trailer you see Theo use a grappling hook to shoot at a helicopter, but during races you can use that to grab corners for tight turns as well as grab rival cars and pull them back. There will also be Nitrous and an oil slick to get advantages. I did ask how that would be balanced in online races, and they mentioned it would be on a timed countdown system which they are still tweaking so they aren’t spammable.

Customization is a huge things for Clutch and will be a way to express yourself in game to other drivers.

All and all I really liked what I saw of Clutch. The map and lighting is gorgeous. They did a great job scanning in landmarks and recreating real life Monaco and the French Riviera. That being said, some liberties have had to be taken with street widths to make it fun and actually drivable. I think Maverick Games has something good here, and as long as they can balance the pacing of the cinematic story telling with fun driving, Clutch should be a great time.

Clutch is aiming for a Spring 2027 release on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC.

*All photo’s were provided by the publisher