Full Game Teardown: iRacing Arcade

Welcome to a Full Game Teardown. My review of the latest offering in the racing game world.

The world of racing games is always moving, growing and evolving. There is always so much in store and new adventures to be had whenever a newcomer comes up to bat regardless of it being a sequel in a long running franchise, or a wholly new and original release. And it will be always worth finding out of it's a good video game as well as being a good racing game and discover where it can grow and improve.

Today we are looking at iRacing Arcade, developed by Original Fire Games and published through iRacing Studios.

In cooking, one of the theories that allows meals to shine and be as satisfying as possible is when layers of flavor are built throughout the act of cooking. It's when everything in that step by step process comes together to fulfill certain intended profiles and end up working in harmony when the final meal is served. But that has to start somewhere; there has to be a base to build up from, or multiple bases that will soon come together. The prep work pays dividends when the ingredients used are at their best and given the dignity and respect they deserve when it's time to potentially then add salt, fat, acid, or heat. And sometimes, you see that work shine through in a video game.

A lot of my thinking about iRacing Arcade has come through this idea of two separate IPs full of self-confidence in what they are now being given the chance to compliment each other in ways that previously hadn't been tried in the genre. It's a fusion of mechanics, principals and ingredients suited to compliment each other that makes iRacing Arcade a very cool video game.

Original Fire Games's previous release, Circuit Superstars, revealed itself as among the best offerings out there if you wanted a more direct wheel to wheel racing experience that was just good fun. It followed the lineage put in place by R.C. Pro-Am in the best way possible and expanded on those horizons by exploring as much of the racing world as it could and doing so in a bright, vibrant and playful package. Underneath there was some real depth now on offer with pit strategy and racecraft now a part of the party; and made online racing an engaging challenge that is brimming with customization to make bespoke experiences for your friends or for leagues.

The only concession for Circuit Superstars is the single player campaign was a very linear experience, moving from one championship to the next using different cars and disciplines of racing along the way. You had access to five different difficulties and the game wanted you to build your skills and experience and move up to those tougher challenges. But that was it; Circuit Superstars's single player lacked a certain level of replayability that opened the door for a sequel that would expand on the fantastic bones and foundations in place.

Enter, iRacing; and a licensing deal for what would come next. What the iRacing licensing and the integration of some of it's mechanics provides is a structure that the flavorful racing from Circuit Superstars can attach to. That structure becomes the basis of the Career Mode, which uses the season system and progression structure of iRacing to create an evergreen single player campaign with great replayability and room for growth post-launch.

It uses iRacing's 12 week season structure with multiple championships you can enter that run for a fraction of the season. When a new championship starts, you can choose to enter it or withdraw and leave it to next season if you don't have the car or want to focus your priorities. Come Week 13 is a one-off special event separate from the championships, before the cycle begins again with new events opening up based on your team level. That team level is used as your progression marker to unlock new championships, new cars to buy, and further upgrades for your campus's facilities. Those facilities provide bonus perks that you can equip for a race event, with a deck of perks being rolled for each week by those facilities. Those perks become key in the harder difficulties and as races become longer and more engaging with cars that have much more power under the hood. It's a very well thought out system that gives the player a chance to fight back against incredibly potent ai racers, and sometimes you just want to see your driver have a big head while behind the wheel of a LMP2 car.

iRacing Arcade sees itself use the big moneymaker of iRacing as the other core structure at hand, being the cars and tracks you get to use. While Circuit Superstars explored a lot of the variety that exists in racing, at launch there is only the paved road racing side of iRacing on offer within iRacing Arcade. Though the actual car count is slim, each car on offer works well in terms of naturally progressing from the entry level, low-license series to the top flight series that would require a A-level license on iRacing. There's a good, natural progression of power and grip underneath you before the game goes to another level when you buy the Porsche 911 GT3 Cup car. That's when the power level starts to become greater than the grip can deal with in the slow corners; that's when the challenge really picks up and the satisfaction of a job well done when you do win a race, and that gets compounded when you nail the perks you brought to the track.

When it comes to the racing, iRacing Arcade uses that platform and structure of Circuit Superstars to it's fullest but now with a major spin. Moving from a top-down perspective to the more contemporary chase camera perspective does provide it's own challenges in terms of greater graphical requirements and making the cars react to a fuller 3D environment, but the team at Original Fire Games was more than up to the task. The game runs very well even on a older laptop like what I have, and reveals itself as one of the best racing game options for a Steam Deck and ideally a Nintendo Switch 2.

Races are rapid-fire and hard-fought, with ai opponents that are constantly pushing the pace even as they're battling. In longer races pit strategy will come into play with undercuts and fuel saving both possible and incredibly satisfying to make stick. You wouldn't think lifting and coasting to save fuel would work, but it can make the difference in the endurance championships and it's remarkable to see it be this potentially effective in such a package. Just be mindful to make sure you're refueled to the finish or have the perk that gives you bonus fuel for the last lap if you under-fuel by accident. Finishing your stop early is as simple as tapping the throttle by accident and it completely resets the pit stop process.

The cars do drive like they did in Circuit Superstars as well, but it takes a new light and understanding with this new perspective which I had talked about when I played the demo at the Vancouver Game Expo. The outside front tire does a lot of the heavy lifting in turns come the middle apex, while also being very obvious in indicating to the player when it is at it's limit in terms of speed combined with the turning radius, paired with audio cues coming from the engine and tires. Cars glide into the corners, and chicane or s-bend sections like at Imola or at Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez is where the game's driving dynamics shine and is a blast to drive. The ai are very good at maintaining momentum through corners, which then leaves the door for you to sail into corners at max speed while compromising your exit. It makes for a great dynamic in battling, and a satisfying experience when you're able to break through and come out on top.

As previously mentioned; the car count is slim in iRacing Arcade, at least at launch. There's only eight cars are in the game; split between the open wheel and sports car licenses that make up the paved road racing scene on iRacing. Though some of the sports car racing series that are in iRacing Arcade are multiclass affairs in iRacing proper, they remain single spec series here as there's only 12 cars on track during a race. With the length of races and grids set by reverse championship order like in Mario Kart, that 12 car per race number is just right for type and flow of racing at hand.

The track selection is very good; naturally building up in complexity as the events ramp up in difficulty and challenge, with all the bite-sized recreations of real tracks looking fantastic. All the elements in terms of livery and driver customization return from Racing Superstars too, though a clipboard or a favorites tab for colors when in the creator tools would have been much appreciated to make preparing a newly bought car easier. The game does a very good job in having tool-tips in your first season helping to explain the game's elements and mechanics, though a couple more would help with players when it does come time to do a race with a pit stop or hiring a ai driver to run a championship for you.

You would be hard pressed not to see this as Circuit Superstars 2 with how a lot of what made the original work continuing on in iRacing Arcade; but with that platform to build off of being so good already, why mess with what works? Why not use that platform, combine it with another platform that works similarly well with iRacing's core seasonal structure, and make something that has revealed itself as one of the best racing games of the decade thus far? An evergreen career mode with just enough off-track elements combined with great driving and racing on-track is one of the ideal formulas for a racing game, and that's what iRacing Studios has delivered in their last two published releases.

Leaving VGX, I had full confidence that iRacing Arcade was in good hands in lieu of the then recently announced delay. The small team at Original Fire Games wanted that little bit of extra time to make sure the game was right the first time. That wait was infinitely worth it, and that extra time to build those extra layers of flavor paid off. iRacing Arcade is very, very good and well worth your time and money.

You can find iRacing Arcade on Steam, with a console release to be expected later on this year.

Special thanks to Cisco Scaramuzza for inviting me to be a part of the press coverage for iRacing Arcade, it's always an honor and a pleasure to be a part of this adventure.