There are two things in life that we crave: speed and mud. That is the reason why it is easy to keep Milestone's latest arcade racer, Gravel.
The career mode of Gravel is central and is built around a fictional TV show called Off-Road Masters. The setup is extremely traditional: you collect stars to unlock new competitions and the better you drive, the more stars you collect in each race. Occasionally this rhythm is broken with a 'final boss fight' against one of the better drivers from the game, such as characters like Scott Parker.
The final bosses are introduced in the most extravagant way you can imagine. For example, Scott Parker wears his oiled hair under his trucker's cap while he plays air guitar and is accompanied by a series of colorful explosions. This is the overall framework of the content in Gravel and, apart from the fact that it is cut off, it does not feel sincere for what the studio is normally known for. It seems rather something that has been added to slash the focus group to the whims of the intended audience.
The career mode, apart from the flirtation with a lost puberty, is well organized. Although it harks back to racing games of yesteryear, it also feels refreshing not to have a gigantic open world where we have to bridge distances between competitions or break billboards for experience points like in the Forza Horizon games. Gravel is divided into fifteen 'episodes', in which the different types of competitions all take place and that feels easy and logical without being boring or stale.
Among the different race types or categories in which the races are divided, there is not really something that really stands out. Here you will find standard races, time trials, elimination races and something called "smash-ups". In this last race you race on your own on a track and you have to collide with certain objects at specific times. This mode requires reflexes plus patience and is in our opinion the most entertaining thing the game has to offer. Moreover, it is something that we are only too happy to see in other race titles.
Something else that we really enjoyed in Gravel was that Milestone completely abandoned the well-known design in which you unlock new cars and new car parts; your car tunet or builds; or unlocking new jobs and other hidden things. Instead, everything revolves around the stars that you collect and whether you get enough experience points to start the next race.
As far as the car 'physics' and the steering feel of the cars in Gravel are concerned: there really is nothing that comes close to realism. This is through and through an arcade racer and that means bouncing, super fast and reactive cars as you might know from Sega Rally or Motorstorm. It does not matter if you are driving a pick-up truck or a Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution rally car, Gravel always feels the same and the grip of the cars in the game are almost negligible. However, it is entertaining. We enjoyed Gravel. Milestone, however, could have given the cars a bit more weight.
Milestone has released racing games such as Ride, Ride 2, Moto GP and WRC (up to WRC 4 ) and was never really the best in graphics, at least not compared to competitors like Polyphone Digital, Playground Games and Ghost Games. The cars in Gravel lack details and the lighting is almost always below par. The gravel coming off the turning tires also looks strange and the presentation feels sawn off and weird, as we mentioned earlier. Gravel, however, runs extremely smoothly and that is the strongest point from a distant point of view. We have tried the game on multiple platforms and it works fine everywhere.
The music also deserves special attention: it is terrible. It sounds like the Spice Girls started a metal band and it was only a matter of time before we decided to turn off all the music in the game. We must say that we have thoroughly enjoyed Gravel. Even though the music is agonizing and the graphics of mediocrity. It is a retro-like arcaderacer aimed at fun with simple design that sweeps away contemporary extras. That makes it somewhat superficial, but sometimes that is exactly what you want. Gravel deserves the necessary extra finishing touch (hopefully via updates) and would benefit from a little more weight in the cars.
The plus and minus points
✔ The racing itself is entertaining; sense of speed; good jobs; varied modes.
✖ Boring graphics; physics lack weight; terrible music; bad presentation.
Thanks for reading, I hope you liked it!
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