The Antidote to The Antiseptic Isn't Being Televised

"There was a time when blisteringly fast arcade racing games were more commonplace," was how a piece from Aftermath co-founder Chris Person starts off in talking about how Star Wars: Galactic Racer scratches that itch that the racing game genre seemingly forgot was possible it could scratch. It's a call back to the early 2000s where a fuller expression of the spectrum that is the racing game was something that the major publishers and developers were more than happy to partake in, and that includes racing games that had greasy fast speed and were nasty about it.

In the early 2010s, all the major players put their foot on the brakes and didn't let off. Burnout morphed into Need For Speed for three games and then was left to die. Studio Liverpool was deemed expendable by Sony, even as they were deep at work on a new Wipeout that would have been a launch title for the Playstation 4 while Motorstorm was left behind on the PS3. Nintendo has stated in the past that they needed a major cause or innovation for them to make a new major F-Zero title, though it hasn't stopped them from remaking Star Fox 64 on multiple occasions and sometimes with innovations that would fit with their anti-gravity racer. I mean, who doesn't want their VTuber to be Douglas J. Falcon?

It's one of the layers of the perceived death of the racing game that was then heralded in the years that follow, and some of the franchises that continued on would be not long for this world either. The only dedicated so-called AAA racing games left standing are Gran Turismo and the genocide-funding Forza Horizon after Forza Motorsport too got sent to the wood chipper mere months ago.

But, racing games aren't dead. If all you see is what's firmly in the mainstsream and duly reported by it, of course you're going to believe that racing games are down the tubes. Of course you're going to believe that there haven't been any new games that scratched that itch you reveled in twenty years ago. Of course it will give a dire impression at what racing games that aren't hardcore realistic have become; split between the absolute reverence of the automobile of Gran Turismo and a worn out free roam experience that is more simulacra and touristy in nature than truly representative of car culture of a Forza Horizon. Of course it's going to give the impression that Star Wars: Galactic Racer is an absolute breath of fresh air and a racing game that's a long time coming.

So what's got me and a few others pissed off?

There is an antagonism of what's believed to be left of the racing game genre Chris Person discusses in the last paragraph of his piece, that gets doubled down upon in his skeet promoting the piece. The skeet describes Star Wars: Galactic Racer as "the antidote to the antiseptic, licensed car collection simulators we have grown accustomed to." If that's your understanding of what remains of the racing game genre, then yeah it would look like that. It would look like that when you, who writes and plays video games for a living, simply follow what the major developers and publishers have done to the racing game genre in the last 15 years, only played what them and their ilk have put out there, and acted like nobody would fill the vacuum that's been created after the major players left. If he's played indie and non-mainstream racing titles, maybe he should've said something and written about them like it's his job and gave credence to those filling that vacuum on their own accord.

Chris is giving the impression that nobody has willingly tried to fill that void and recreated a fuller racing game spectrum, and more that he does not care about those that have tried. It gives the impression that Chris got what he wanted, powered by nostalgia and ignorant bliss, and it's the fault of the rest of the genre for not doing that; when it's not like there hasn't been games that have tried. There has been, but they're not from the contemporary names in the space or associated to the biggest IPs in all of North American media. So why would Aftermath throw them a bone when they aren't going to get people in the door, reading their articles, and paying the bills in the same way?

In the wake of the demise of Wipeout and F-Zero we have had two Redout games, Pacer created by former Studio Liverpool developers and even brought back The Designers Republic, the Fast franchise has fully filled that void on Nintendo consoles while the solo-developed Aero GPX raised the aggression and high paced racing levels beyond what F-Zero X and GX were capable of. Attempts to turn back the clock and make a new Burnout in spirit have been done with former Criterion developers taking full responsibility, though it took for Wreckcreation for those efforts to land after Dangerous Driving and Danger Zone left something to be desired. But those are just the primary references to games that had been yearned for in the 20 years after the perceived heyday of the racing game; the genre has moved on, evolved, but the way the racing game genre has been covered by major publications hasn't grown outside of that disdain for what it's not or it's claimed obituary.

Were those passing shots at the Gran Turismo and Forza Horizons of the world truly even necessary when the rest of the genre isn't beholden to licenses and it's restrictions in the same way? What's even a Dubai-brained hoarding simulator anyways? Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown? What does this say about the freedom that those racing games can provide and the fact that such racing games should exist regardless?

Racing games are not dead, but those who are keeping one of gaming's most historic and storied genres alive these past years aren't getting the credit they deserve, or any credit at all.

This is all not to glaze over what Star Wars: Galactic Racer has been able to accomplish, and in particular with being among the first to explore a new way that the racing game campaign could be. Most racing games cannot operate with a run-based system in the nature of a roguelike; for most titles it's not a structure beholden to what the game is trying to be though not to their fault. It is a structure that is begging for a Cannonball Run racing game however; a follow-up to Need For Speed The Run since EA won't do it themselves. Matt Webster brought the band back together after they all left Criterion, dialed up old concepts that they knew people would like, added something revolutionary, and had the ultimate ace up their sleeve of an IP that could bring it all together in the Star Wars extended universe. But if it didn't have the money and the might of one of the biggest legacy media properties on it's side in by-god Disney, would it have landed with the same impact or befallen a similar fate to another racing game that should be tipping the scales but tragically isn't?

Aftermath did not cover Screamer at all. The ultimate payoff to Milestone's revolution that kicked off with the first Hot Wheels Unleashed was them bringing back one of their original success stories in a form that the racing game genre had simply never seen. An anime racing game built as the vessel to keep a visual novel moving is similarly brilliant to the potential of a rougelike racing game, though has the added benefit of giving writers, storytellers and artists a new avenue to explore conflicts, character developments and topics that were seemingly impossible prior in the genre. It gives cleaner means to introduce new gameplay elements without overwhelming the player, before bringing it all together in some of the highest-octane, nasty racing that the genre has ever seen that doesn't just rehash elements from the best racing game ever made but now in space to do it. There isn't the same ambition for a better racing game genre coming from a Burnout and Motorstorm in space, regardless of the flesh attached to those bones.

Screamer flew completely under the radar after making back to back appearances at The Game Awards in both 2024 and 2025 with momentum failing to be maintained within the broader gaming apparatus. I could only speculate as to why, but it's not like Milestone has had much benefit of the doubt in their other titles either. Milestone has been able to maintain a even keel in the face of their developer compatriots falling by the wayside within the racing game genre, however the coverage of racing games concentrated on the big names that stayed, rather than giving those who kept the genre truly alive a real chance to break through. An opportunity that Aftermath could have given themselves if they elected to be serious about their editorial freedom compared to their peers and fill the gaps that would have been created if they did take the No Games for Genocide pledge for instance. Even without taking the pledge, the racing game genre is vast beyond what remains of the AAA conveyance and the dry, overly-binary expression of the hardcore realistic racer, and it's something that could have been championed in a big way by a reader-funded outlet. It would have gotten Tokyo Xtreme Racer more than one article a year before it was fully complete too.

Every publication is making a active choice with that they write, and what they don't write about. People will make choices and decisions with their money based on what's said, and what's not. As Ian Walker noted in his response to Aftermath's coverage of FH6, "you do not have to follow trends or the whims of the industry, especially if you run your own website," and the genre that feels most caught out by following the whims of the industry is racing games. They were one of the genres caught most high and dry as the AAA conveyance truly took hold with games like The Last of Us redefining what video games could be in the greater entertainment sphere. It's a genre that doesn't have the capacity to keep up with the new expected returns from the heavy hitters, unless they were the only show in town on a machine that helps fund the Palestinian Genocide.

Aftermath does not have to follow the whims of the industry, but they and their founder Chris Person are choosing to. Star Wars: Galactic Racer isn't the revolution, because it already happened and they simply did not notice or care.

Yes, enjoy Galactic Racer; it's pretty damn cool. But if you don't want to get yelled at, maybe don't act like there's only three racing games on the market and this is the third and then get salty about it when you get challenged on that.