For those who want to play alone, individual races or battles against AI opponents are the only option there’s no story mode, not even an equivalent of a fighting game’s Arcade Mode. This is a multiplayer-focused game, and though there’s nothing inherently wrong with that, I couldn’t help but be disappointed after how much I enjoyed the arcade-like Challenge mode in the original game. When the tutorial ends and you see the main menu for the first time, it’s immediately clear that single-player modes are almost entirely non-existent. It’s a wave of nostalgia and modernity all rolled into one very sharp training level.īut after that, everything starts to fall apart. It certainly looks the part too, with this tutorial playing out across a tabletop arena made up of books, pens, and other pieces of stationery. Each car has its own set of abilities based around a particular play style – the ambulance is a healer, for example – and a special ability that charges with time and kills. There’s a modern control scheme with acceleration and brakes on the shoulder buttons, and a role-based approach to car design that’s no doubt inspired by MOBAs and character-focused shooters like Overwatch. The first time you boot up the game, you load straight into a brief tutorial to get you up to speed.

The game actually starts off quite strong. After years spent slipping further and further off the radar, and being passed around between different studios to middling results, Micro Machines looked set for a comeback. It’s not a game that I played extensively, granted, and I didn’t really discover it until long after its initial release, but I still have vivid memories of that first Micro Machines and its sequel, Micro Machines 2: Turbo Tournament.Īlso like a lot of people, I was very much looking forward to Micro Machines World Series, because – at least prior to release – it looked set to deliver everything that made those early games great, but in a modernised way. Then Micro Machines came along, and as limited as it was, given the technology of the day, it still managed to bring those games to life in a way that only a videogame can. I used to play with the Micro Machines toys as a kid, building make-believe cities out of whatever I had at hand and then driving these little tiny cars around. Like a lot of people, I have fond childhood memories of playing Micro Machines.

Ps4 micro machines world series review