Review for Nickelodeon Kart Racers. Game for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, the video game was released on 23/10/2018
In an industry where Cartoon Network and Disney have dominated for years, Nickelodeon has always tried to stand out by creating respectable brands like Spongebob or Ninja Turtles. However, the canal's prestige has never really stood out when we approached the Nickelodeon Kart Racers tie-in we weren't expecting a high budget product, but a normal title aimed at children. The final product surprised us both positively, without miracles of any kind, and negatively.
In general, our expectations have been met, Nickelodeon Kart Racers is a title aimed at children, with huge flaws but still capable of entertaining.
The first, and most obvious, problem of the title is aesthetics. Although it is obviously a "budget" title Nickelodeon Kart Racers looks like an ugly game to see, not very detailed in the settings and with characters with a horrifying aesthetic. This is partially offset by an intelligent use of colors, very saturated, which manages to distract attention from the lack of care, but still remains a problem if you focus on looking at the environments and characters. Since this is a game dedicated to its most famous brands, Nickelodeon Kart Racers should make the most of the settings to make them recognizable when played, yet many are on the verge of unrecognizable even if you know the cartoon of origin.
Second big problem is the content of the game. The races are not few, indeed, it is a game with several tracks and also some nice ideas to differentiate them from each other which I will talk about later. These tracks, however, give very little longevity to the game due to the total absence of an online sector. Even the option of replaying them with different characters, to change vehicles and unique weapons, does not pay much, as the game features only 12 characters, from just 3 of the company's TV series. The game redeems itself with a rather nice arena mode, and tries to increase its content with a variety of vehicle upgrade materials, to be unlocked with a currency that can be obtained by competing or participating in "laps of honor".
A strange peculiarity of the title concerns the trophies. These in addition to highlighting the obvious, that is how the title is addressed to the little ones, are managed in a strange way since it will not be possible to unlock the trophies related to the easy or normal difficulty by playing in expert mode. This means that for platinum you will have to play all the tracks at least 3 times, one per mode. The sound side is also bad, which can even be annoying in the long run due to sound effects placed at random in the middle of the backing tracks.
Speaking of the game itself, the sky above Nickelodeon Kart Racers clears up. To put the record straight away, the game is a very low quality mario kart clone, comparable to Shrek's tie-ins available on Playstation 2, but it doesn't make it fun for that reason. The tracks don't shine for complexity, but they do their job by giving the player obstacles, shortcuts and upgrades; moreover at each final lap which all the tracks change by varying the paths that can be taken.
To give variety to their races, Nickelodeon Kart Racers also offers variants with special rules, such as elimination or slalom, and these variants are usually placed as third races in the Trophies, thus giving a light pacing to the competition. In terms of difficulty, the game is not set as low as we expected: being aimed at children, winning is not at all difficult, but it can give some slight challenges and, from a child's point of view, it can represent a good point. entry into video games.
Nickelodeon Kart Racers is a poorly crafted title on an aesthetic level and with few contents, but it is not a bad game if the target it is intended for is considered. The balance of difficulty makes it a good entry point into the world of video games for the little ones and the variety of the races always manages to keep them fun without them being stuffy. With an online mode to give it longevity and a better sound sector this would be a decent low-budget and kid-friendly alternative to Mario Kart, in case you obviously don't own Nintendo Switch, otherwise the titles are incomparable even with all the excuses of the case.
► Nickelodeon Kart Racers is a racing type game developed and published by Maximum Games for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, the video game was released on 23/10/2018
