I thought this was a semi-realistic rally game like Art of Rally, but I really didn't like that power sliding increases your speed and the co-driver sounds like Pikachu.

This game is really fun, if you like rally racing games. The soundtrack is awesome too. Runs really well on CachyOS for both desktop and handheld (Rog Ally X). Using the latest cachyos proton version.

I have a new favourite racing game of all time and it's Super Woden Rally Edge.

I didn't even know this game was coming out, in fact I hadn't even played any of the previous Super Woden games, but in January there was a smorgasbord of positive reviews on the racing game websites I frequent which encouraged me to take the plunge despite my lack of experience with the franchise and I wasn't disappointed.

Super Woden Rally Edge isn't like your usual racing games as it takes to perspective to almost isometric except the camera still follows behind the car rather than stay static, it's certainly not a camera perspective I have come across before in any genre, let alone the racing genre. What this means is that you get a better idea of what kind of corners are coming up compared to what you normally have in a racing game.

As with any racing game, the most important thing is how the cars feel to drive and this is where the game truly excels. To me it's perfect, especially for a rally game in which you need to balance the ability to slide around corners at fast pace alongside the ability to do hand brake turns around tight corners without the back end of the car spinning out. They strike this balance perfectly, even when you are driving in a near straight line, the steering isn't too sensitive if you need to make any slight adjustments. This might sound quite sad to others, but the one thing in the whole of gaming that makes me go "oooohhh yeeeaahhh" is when you nail drifting around a corner touching the apex with the front of your car through the whole turn and I have managed to do that many times whilst playing this game and it makes me feel like prime Colin McRae.

The game has a career mode and arcade mode, the career mode is a nice length at around 12 hours and offers a nice progression curve whereby you are often able to do the first few events in each class of car with the basic car you have for that class, but you will need to spend on upgrades on the same car to be able to win in the latter events. Sometimes you will need to replay events for money to buy upgrades or new cars but it never feels like a grind because in revisiting events you will no doubt be going for the 3 stars in the event as it is unlikely you will have been able to achieve 3 stars in your non upgrading car from the first time you did the event.

You might be thinking why the game doesn't get 5 stars? Well one minor criticsm I have is that sometimes the pace notes from your co driver seem off. For example there might be a 'medium right' turn approaching, yet it turns out it is more like a 'hard right' or vice versa. Once I had learnt the stages it wasn't as much of a problem but the first few times it was a bit irritating to go over the crest of a hill expecting one kind of corner only for a totally different corner to appear and ruin my attempt.

If you are a fan of rally games or arcade races, I couldn't recommend this game enough either on PC (great Steamdeck game) or when it comes to consoles. I haven't even mentioned the lovely art, fantastic engine sounds and soundtrack. I can only see GTA 6 eclipsing this as my GOTY.