Hot Lap Racing Review: On the Right Track

The Nintendo Switch has no shortage of racing games, but there’s a noticeable lack of serious track racers, with no Gran Turismo or Forza Motorsport equivalent on the platform. Instead, Nintendo’s hybrid console is more synonymous with casual, family-friendly racers, from first-party exclusives like Mario Kart 8: Deluxe and Cruis’n Blast, to the excellent ports of Burnout Paradise and Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit.

The last notable motorsport-focused Switch game with licensed cars and circuits was GRID Autosport – a 2018 port of a PS3 and Xbox 360 game released ten years ago. Now, Hot Lap Racing by French indie developer Zero Games Studio aims to plug the gap for motorsport fans on Nintendo Switch.

With its selection of (mostly) licensed cars and circuits coupled with its more serious take on motor racing than most Switch games, Hot Lap Racing sounds like the Switch’s answer to Forza Motorsport and Gran Turismo. However, this isn’t a fair comparison.

Compared to Forza and Gran Turismo, Hot Lap Racing was developed by a small indie team on a tight budget for an older platform. As a result, don’t expect high production values and hundreds of cars.

A love letter to motor racing

Despite these limitations, Hot Lap Racing stands out thanks to its small but eclectic car list. Celebrating multiple eras of motorsport, the 50+ car roster features several manufacturers rarely seen in modern racing games such as Minardi, Noble, and Venturi.

Naturally, given the developer’s French origins, there’s a focus on French manufacturers like Citroen, Peugeot, and Alpine, but the game’s smaller budget means you won’t find high-end manufacturers like Ferrari, Lamborghini, or Aston Martin.

The variety of racing disciplines make up for this, with cars from the past and present split into categories including single-seater, GT, endurance, electric, and more. Touring car fans can race classic Renault Laguna and Vauxhall Cavalier cars from the BTCC’s golden era, complete with 1997 and 1998 championship lookalike liveries.

Not every car is licensed, but it’s easy to tell what the unlicensed cars are based on. For example, one production car is clearly an unbadged Subaru Impreza WRX STI.

From vintage Brabham single-seaters to a modern Le Mans prototype, there’s something for every motorsport fan. These classes can also mixed up in custom races, allowing you to create fantasy races with single-seaters and Le Mans prototypes on the same grid.

No other Switch racer can match the vehicle variety on offer here. Zero Games Studio’s passion for motor racing shines, resulting in a more interesting car selection than the predictable lists in other modern racing games.

As for the tracks, you won’t find world-famous tracks like Silverstone, Red Bull Ring, or Monaco. However, motorsport aficionados will recognize real-life circuits like Austria’s Salzburgring (the former home of the Austrian GP), Spain’s Jarama (the Spanish Formula 4 circuit), and Germany’s Oschersleben, which previously hosted the European Touring Car Championship. These are mixed with fictional circuits, including a standout track set in the French Riveria.

Career driven

Hot Lap Racing’s Career mode sees you compete in various motorsport types on the way to the final Formula Xtreme event featuring fictional concepts designed for the game. Completing a championship unlocks the next tier of races. Like the first two Project CARS games, you’re free to choose your path, and cars are automatically assigned to you in each race, so you don’t need to grind for credits to buy new vehicles.

With only 13 championships to complete, the career mode is on the short side, and a few more race types, like elimination and drifting events, would have added more variety.

Before starting your career, you must prove your skills in the Feed Racing School. Serving as a tutorial, ten Gran Turismo-style tests teach you the basics of racing such as braking points, or you can attempt to beat a driver’s time in a hot lap event.

These tests are punishing with no margin for error, so the initial difficulty may put some players off – accidentally clipping a cone results in a restart. Most drivers you’ll encounter in the career are fictional, but a few real racing drivers make photographic cameos like Formula 4’s Augustin Bernier.

Zero Games describes Hot Lap Racing as a simcade game rather than a pure arcade racer. This is an accurate description, though it falls closer to a latter, with approachable driving physics comparable to Codemasters’ GRID games.

Some cars feel floaty and tend to oversteer, making it feel like you’re sometimes driving on ice. Thankfully, the responsive controls make it relatively easy to correct despite the Switch’s digital-only controls. If you want more precise inputs, we recommend remapping the acceleration and braking to the right analog stick.

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Conveniently, assists like traction control can be turned on or off on the fly using the d-pad, but we wish the game would remember our preferred settings when starting a new race. There are also no simulation elements like car damage, pit stops, or fuel management.

Visually, Hot Lap Racing pushes the Switch to its limits, with sharp textures even in handheld mode. While the circuits are sparse and the lighting is flat, the cars are well-modeled. Unusually for a Switch game, every car also boasts unique and surprisingly detailed cockpits when playing with the immersive in-car camera, with working mirrors and dials, and gear-shifting animations. It’s easily the best cockpit view of any Switch racer.

Stalling on the grid

Unfortunately, Hot Lap Racing suffers from performance issues. While it would be a stretch to expect the game to run at a smooth 60 fps, it sometimes struggles to hit 30 fps. This makes the game feel choppy when racing at speed, particularly at the start of races in packed grids. At this late stage of the Switch’s lifecycle, the hardware is showing its age.

If you don’t own a Switch, Hot Lap Racing is also out on Steam. While the PC version offers smoother performance and higher resolutions, it’s based on the Switch version, limiting the visual upgrades. Hot Lap Racing has less competition on Switch, but there are far better alternatives on PC.

Aside from the performance, Hot Lap Racing’s most glaring issue is the AI. You can have some thrilling battles, but the blind opponents are unaware of your position and have a frustrating habit of bumping into you and spinning you out. You can’t restart races when racing in a championship either, which adds to the frustration.

Even on the highest difficulty setting, leaving opponents in your dust early in the race is often too easy. Zero Games Studios is working on a patch, so these issues should hopefully resolved soon. Alternatively, you can also race against human opponents, either online with 11 other players or in local multiplayer with up to four players.

This lack of polish ultimately lets Hot Lap Racing down. This had the potential to finish on the podium, but performance and AI issues cause it to spin out on the last lap.

Despite its drawbacks, Hot Lap Racing is a solid racer made by a team that clearly has a passion for motorsport, with an unusual car and track selection that sets it apart. If you love motorsport and the Switch is your primary console, Hot Lap Racing shouldn't be missed.

Review

Hot Lap Racing

Hot Lap Racing is a noble attempt at a serious track racer on Switch, hampered by the aging hardware’s limitations. While it lacks the polish and plethora of cars and tracks offered in Gran Turismo and Forza Motorsport, this is an enjoyable track racer with a unique variety of cars and tracks that no other Switch racer can match.

Nintendo Switch

7 out of 10

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