I didn't have my expectations set too highly for Parking Garage Rally Circuit going in. I like the PS1 (or, as the Steam page invokes, Sega Saturn) style of graphics a lot. I find them charming, nostalgic, and pleasing to the eye. But it's also very fashionable at the moment, which means there's no guarantee that a game using them is going to be interesting.
I'm pleased to report that Parking Garage Rally Circuit (which I'm gonna start calling PGRC for my own sanity) is, however, really quite good. It's a very stripped-down racing experience: there's eight tracks, each of which you can go through three times via the three weight classes of car you can unlock. You have an accelerate button, a brake button, and a drift button. That's the game.
The meat, which I was starting to feel even after just an hour of blasting through it, comes in how you use those tools. You nudge left or right and push your drift button to start drifting. Then, you can choose between one of three options—turn inwards for a sharper turn, turn outwards for a larger turn, or let ska take the wheel (the game has a ska soundtrack) and don't turn either way. There's a little bit of leeway, so you can adjust mid-drift if you'd like.
PGRC then dangles a carrot on a stick in front of you—see, if you keep a drift going for long enough, you gain a speed boost. A little longer, and you'll get a bigger jump to your MPH. Chain these powered-up drifts together, and you start flying. Sometimes literally, as your car starts dangerously yeeting itself off every slope like it's a ramp.
Except, drifting also magnetises you to the ground, so with a little bit of clever tire-burning you can ride the lightning by starting a drift before your tires leave the concrete. If I play your game for less than an hour and I already discover hidden tech, I generally take that as a good sign—and it helps that PGRC controls very well. Everything felt responsive and snappy, and any time I lost control of my vehicle, it was typically my fault.
While the game has multiplayer lobbies, I wasn't able to find a game, and given the scope of PGRC I wouldn't hold out hope for a massive competitive scene—but it's there if you want to race your friends. Instead, you'll likely be trying to get gold on every track, as the single-player campaign has you racing ghosts rather than other cars.
One feature which I do think is very clever is that, if you get gold, the game will automatically save your run to a leaderboard. The next time you boot up that track, PGRC will download the replay of the person just ahead of you on that leaderboard, which means that, theoretically, you have an infinite number of phantom opponents to race until you're the very best at that particular circuit.
The only real complaint is the whole parking garage theme. While the game does a good job of swapping things up—making you dodge snow ploughs, throwing debris from Mt. Rushmore at you, and a cute ode to Rainbow Road—parking garages aren't exactly the most exciting visual. It's not a dealbreaker, but I wouldn't have hated a forest or two.
There's not much else to say about PGRC, and I don't think it's a game that'll keep you busy for hours upon hours—but at a price point of $10/£8.50 (less with the introductory offer) it doesn't have to be. Parking Garage Rally Circuit is out now.
