Galactic Racer Review – The Force Is Strong With This One – WGB

Star Wars: Galactic Racer is the form of sport that makes you’re feeling like a Jedi if you barely make it by means of a sequence of tight tunnels with out taking your finger off the ramjet, and a Sith Lord if you intentionally slam one other racer right into a wall at a whole lot of miles per hour, revelling within the ensuing fireball. It’s much less involved with good racing traces, clipping each apex and shaving tenths of a second than it’s with scrappy racing, blistering pace and feeling such as you’re all the time a second away from fucking up. Since you are. Typically it’s not even a second. It’s a blink. Galactic Racer needs to make racing harmful once more, and it succeeds.

REVIEW AT A GLANCE

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Developer Fuse Video games

Writer Secret Mode

Reviewed On PS5

Out there On PS5, Xbox Collection X/S, PC

Launch Date October 6, 2026

Worth (UK) £49.99

Style Racing

Overview Code Offered by the writer.

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Fast Take:

Star Wars: Galactic Racer makes racing really feel genuinely harmful once more. Blistering pace, brutal crashes and fixed risk-versus-reward selections mix to create some of the exhilarating racing video games in years, even when its chaotic streak can often make victory—and defeat—really feel frustratingly outdoors your management.

And someway it has a surprisingly respectable story, too. Kestar Bool is the superbly smug son of an immensely rich man and present champion of the Galactic League, which he’s more and more taking on by throwing his cash and affect round. League founder Darius Pax responds by bringing in Shade, your nearly completely personality-free character, to dethrone Kestar and settle an outdated rating. What follows is a reasonably fundamental plot with a few enjoyable twists, one which makes completely no sense and a solid of racers who get simply sufficient display screen time to indicate some persona. It isn’t nearly as good because the latest Star Wars: Zero Firm, however by racing-game requirements it’s nice—and leagues forward of regardless of the hell Forza Horizon 6 was doing with its cardboard cutout characters. The best way it brings a minor Star Wars character into the story is genuinely good, too.

Three varieties of speeder can be found, every with its personal superior cornering method. The landspeeder is the steady, sturdy all-rounder, utilizing a heavy-feeling drift that calls for you let go a cut up second earlier than you assume you must. The smaller speeder bike accelerates exhausting and brakes into tight turns earlier than firing that saved power again out as a Kinetic Burst, making it my favorite for slim routes. Then there’s the skim speeder, which maintains momentum by rolling 90 levels onto a Knife Edge. It’s simply my least favorite of the three: even after spending extra time with it, Knife Edge by no means felt as helpful or satisfying as the opposite methods, whereas transitioning from one flip into the following may really feel unusually sluggish.

However there’s another class, and the one Star Wars followers are most likely ready for: podracers. They’re launched later within the marketing campaign earlier than turning into an even bigger a part of the motion, and really feel terrific to tear across the tracks. The digital camera can get a bit wonky in tight areas, and squeezing these large machines by means of heaters barely huge sufficient to stop them freezing could be a ache within the arse. In some methods, although, that feels acceptable. These fuckers are supposed to be almost unimaginable to drive, and as soon as they rise up to hurry the sense of barely managed energy is phenomenal.

There are two buttons you’ll have your fingers on nearly always: the Afterburner, which progressively refills itself, and the way more potent Ramjet that permits you to attain most speeds and most screaming. Getting into the Ramjet’s redline means playing with a random explosion, whereas fully filling the warmth meter usually ensures one. Loads of components and Racer Types actively reward you for staying there, turning each additional second right into a query of whether or not to again off or maintain pushing your luck.

That call occurs whilst you’re already barreling by means of tiny tunnels, selecting shortcuts, dodging rocks, preventing different racers and barely making bends with a fraction of a second to spare. Technically, there’s a brake, however utilizing it looks like an admission of defeat. A wall isn’t one thing you casually bounce off earlier than carrying on; hit one exhausting sufficient and also you’re going up in a fireball whereas everybody else disappears into the gap. Not like the squeaky-clean racing of Forza Horizon 6, your errors right here have enamel.

The sense of pace begins barely slower than you would possibly count on, however each Improve additionally will increase your car’s general tempo. By the top of a tour you’re completely blasting alongside, one thing that’s particularly noticeable through the condensed multiplayer excursions, the place the development occurs throughout 5 preliminary occasions. The primary race can really feel nearly sedate in contrast with the ludicrous speeds you’re reaching by the fifth.

The tracks assist all of this fantastically, switching between huge areas the place everybody can brawl and tight ravines, tunnels and caves the place there may be barely room to breathe. They’re stuffed with shortcuts and various routes that reward studying, though readability could be a difficulty on these first makes an attempt when you’ve got nearly no time to work out the place the sport needs you to go. It turns into much less of an issue as you be taught every observe, however these preliminary races can really feel punishing.

Then you definately’ve obtained environmental hazards and the opposite racers to fret about. Acid corrodes your car, lava heats it up and snowy tundras cool the ramjet whereas progressively freezing your steering, turning you right into a sliding ice block desperately attempting to string the needle by means of a heater at fuck is aware of what number of kilometres per hour. In the meantime, everybody round you is attempting to slam you into partitions or disable your techniques with talents. There’s an depth to it that makes my mind sing, a sense of all the time being on the razor’s fringe of management as you be taught the place you’ll be able to lower corners, the place the hidden routes are and when that additional resilience enables you to threat driving straight by means of the hazard.

There’s lots of Burnout DNA within the workforce behind Galactic Racer, and it reveals each time a takedown sends one other car erupting right into a spectacular fireball of particles. The digital camera instantly snaps over to benefit from the destruction whereas your speeder goes into autopilot, which could be very cool proper up till it arms management again simply in time so that you can hit one other wall. That solely occurred to me twice, and the function could be turned off, however it neatly captures how shortly triumph can turn into catastrophe.

The presentation is genuinely wonderful all spherical. Galactic Racer appears to be like improbable for one thing that isn’t a gigantic-budget Star Wars manufacturing, with stunning tracks and a robust sense of place throughout its planets. Crait is a selected spotlight as your car tears throughout white salt and exposes the pink earth beneath. The voice appearing is respectable, the sense of pace is great and it evokes Star Wars properly—proper right down to these scene-wipe transitions the sequence seemingly can’t escape. It additionally ran at a easy 60 frames per second all through on PS5, with no crashes or significant efficiency issues throughout my time enjoying.

The marketing campaign wraps that racing inside a Galactic Tour cut up into three acts, carrying you thru escalating occasions throughout seven planets. After every one, you select one other node on a webbed path main by means of commonplace races, higher-risk eliminators, discipline checks, thriller encounters and planetary stopovers. Your rewards depend upon the occasion and the way properly you carry out, starting from stat upgrades and credit to half and skill packs. At every new planet, you’ll be able to spend these credit along with your mechanic, restore faults by means of the scrap supplier and meet up with the opposite racers earlier than heading out once more.

All these rewards feed into constructing the proper car, or no matter weird approximation you’ll be able to cobble collectively from the components you’re supplied. Possibly which means a self-cooling monster that hardly releases the ramjet, one thing primarily based round surging, or sufficient battery energy to abuse talents like I abuse cake. There are a number of hundred components to find and loads of mixtures, though the steadiness at present appears to lean closely in direction of ramjet cooling and resets. I solely randomly exploded a few occasions whereas redlining, making the hazard really feel decrease than anticipated, whereas the strongest builds I discovered may maintain the Ramjet lively for nearly a complete race as soon as I knew the observe.

One journey to the scrap supplier demonstrated how a lot stranger these builds can turn into. It supplied me two closely discounted legendary components that collectively elevated my afterburner length by 500%, however each got here with faults that couldn’t be repaired till the following planetary stopover. One eliminated two factors from my barely upgraded battery. The opposite induced slipstreaming to freeze my car, and I used to be already on an ice planet the place the atmosphere progressively freezes you until you drive by means of large heaters. My plan was easy: use that monstrous Afterburner to get forward of everybody, at which level unintended slipstreaming would not be an issue.

It was an issue. It was a giant downside.

The slipstreaming fault kicked in from a lot additional away than I anticipated, turning my high-powered afterburner beast into a large ice block with a jet engine hooked up to it. With my steering nearly completely gone, all I may do was level myself down a straight and go bloody quick till a nook appeared, at which level I slid helplessly round it whereas everybody overtook me and put me straight again into their slipstream. I additionally ploughed into a few concussive mines as a result of I had the turning skill of a fucking plane service. I finally completed sixth and was grateful I hadn’t picked an eliminator, the place the identical catastrophe may have value me a League Entry Token—or ended my whole tour if it had been my final.

The humorous factor is that the identical construct labored fantastically throughout a later one-on-one podrace. I nonetheless needed to take care of the frozen planet, however with just one opponent I may keep away from their slipstream, hit the warmers and run my Afterburner and Ramjet nearly always. The construct wasn’t horrible; I’d simply used it in fully the incorrect bloody circumstances.

That potential tour-ending catastrophe is the place Galactic Racer’s roguelite—or “runs-based,” because the builders want—construction is available in. Customary races permit a restricted variety of crashes earlier than costing you a League Entry Token, whereas eliminators provide higher rewards however take one in the event you fail to complete within the high three. Exhaust each token and the tour ends, scrapping your present construct again into credit and returning you to the start of that try. The story treats this as a setback quite than a reset, so ongoing relationships and little plot threads can proceed into the following one.

Failure isn’t an entire loss, both. Tuning factors completely enhance every car class, new Elements are added to the reward pool and your unlocked racer types and favors carry over, hopefully providing you with sufficient of an edge to succeed in the championship subsequent time. Additional tokens also can come from thriller encounters, character occasions and favors. On commonplace problem I solely fully wrecked out two or 3 times, so it isn’t the type of roguelite the place dying strikes each 5 seconds, though my transient take a look at of a better setting was significantly harder.

By this level, the sample ought to be apparent: nearly each system in Galactic Racer asks how a lot you’re keen to threat for a little bit extra pace, energy or revenue. Do you enter the redline understanding the ramjet would possibly explode? Try the slim shortcut, purchase the highly effective half carrying a horrible fault, make an bold aspect guess or select an eliminator as a substitute of the safer race? These aren’t separate gimmicks sitting beside the racing; all of them feed the identical gamble, with penalties starting from shedding a couple of positions to destroying a superb construct and ending a complete tour. When these dangers repay, the elation is unimaginable. When the whole lot collapses due to one dangerous choice—or a couple of seconds of chaos—it may be correctly devastating.

Right here’s the place my relationship with Galactic Racer will get difficult. Typically, shedding your remaining token is plainly your individual fault: you pushed the ramjet too exhausting, used up your crashes or gambled on an eliminator you couldn’t deal with. Annoying, certain, however truthful. Then the sport often performs a tactical dick punch. One one-on-one podrace went from me doing completely properly to watching my opponent end eight seconds forward over a single lap, regardless of me operating the Afterburner and Ramjet nearly always. Roguelites are anticipated to place partitions in your path, however this felt extra like operating headfirst into Darth Vader after somebody poured sand into his underpants.

Different frustrations come from how troublesome the chaos could be to learn. Concussive mines flash pink, however turn into remarkably simple to overlook by means of frost, movement blur and the whole lot else demanding your consideration. Rival assaults do present a short focusing on warning, and weapons equivalent to Ion Bolts usually weaken or disable your techniques quite than destroying you outright, however by the point I had parsed the warning, one other racer was generally already ramming me right into a wall. In a traditional racer, which means restarting an occasion. Right here, it will possibly imply shedding a superb construct on the penultimate race or exhausting your remaining Token, which makes these moments correctly infuriating when it feels as if the sport conspired to fuck you over.

You are able to do the whole lot proper and nonetheless lose, and accepting that may be a main a part of Galactic Racer. I don’t forgive each instance: some warnings should be clearer, and people sudden problem spikes could possibly be smoothed out. However eradicating all of that unpredictability would additionally take away one thing important. Barely surviving an eliminator in your remaining token and final out there crash solely feels so extraordinary as a result of one other concussio mine, dangerous touchdown or well-timed assault may have ended the whole lot. Galactic Racer’s lows don’t simply sit beside its highs; generally they’re what make these highs attainable. That emotional whiplash goes to drive some gamers mad. Hell, it steadily drove me mad. But it surely additionally stored each race from feeling protected.

Multiplayer excursions, both in speeders or podracers, take the whole lot enjoyable about the primary marketing campaign and compact it into 5 preliminary occasions adopted by a sixth championship race. Firstly of every occasion, you get to guess on the place you’ll place: possibly a top-six end? Hell, possibly even a podium? The upper the guess, the higher the half pack you earn in the event you succeed. Between races, you additionally obtain improve factors and credit to spend on components and talents.

It’s a super-condensed model of the primary marketing campaign that removes a couple of components, together with half faults and League Entry Tokens, and allows you to focus on the chaos. Oh, and what chaos it’s. With out the chance of shedding tokens and being set again, you’ll be able to deal with having fun with the extraordinary racing, the crashes and the madness.

Nonetheless, I did discover that the multiplayer may have a snowballing subject. Naturally, good gamers will be capable to guess on themselves extra reliably and thus choose up better-quality components, which allow them to do even higher on the observe. There are underdog bonuses given to different gamers, and RNG has lots of say in how excursions play out as properly, as a result of generally folks luck into unstoppable builds. Throughout testing, a number of gamers found a legendary half that gave an overheating ramjet a 90% likelihood of safely resetting itself, and anybody lucky sufficient to get one turned nearly unimaginable to catch.

In different phrases, the multiplayer could be simply as irritating as the primary single-player marketing campaign in the event you aren’t capable of go in with the precise mind set.

Away from the marketing campaign, arcade provides particular person challenges constructed round beating par occasions, whereas Situations string a number of occasions collectively round predetermined characters and themed builds—one, for instance, loaded me up with shield-based rewards and inspired me to barrel by means of environmental hazards. There’s some gratifying score-chasing right here, though eventualities typically really feel like barely extra elaborate Arcade occasions quite than a considerably completely different mode.

There’s a unusual omission: there’s no possibility to only bounce right into a race with bots. I’d usually count on some type of single-player mode the place I can choose a observe and car and possibly customise the principles, like turning off talents or one thing, however there’s nothing like that. Maybe the builders wish to drive you again to the marketing campaign, however generally I simply wish to fireplace up a fast race.

Multiplayer does have this: fast race choices exist for each common speeders and podracers, stripping away the tour’s construct development and leaving you with a extra even enjoying discipline. Effectively, even enjoying discipline till you intentionally slam somebody right into a wall. There’s no split-screen multiplayer both, which isn’t uncommon nowadays however nonetheless looks like a missed alternative for a sport this chaotic.

Regardless of it often making me wish to use a really completely different form of Power to propel my controller right into a wall, Star Wars: Galactic Racer is one in every of my favorite video games of the 12 months to this point. Its thrilling mixture of roguelite construction—a style I assumed I used to be tiring of—and correct balls-to-the-wall arcade racing repeatedly had me leaning in direction of the display screen as I barely made it round bends, blasted down straights and obtained into dogfights with the opposite racers.

It might probably generally really feel unfair, its steadiness wants work and I don’t agree with each one in every of its design selections. That volatility goes to drive some gamers mad, however I’d quite play a racing sport that often makes me livid than one which by no means makes me really feel something in any respect. Galactic Racer makes racing really feel harmful once more, and I fucking beloved it.