Sunday, January 11, 2009
Speed Rally Car Race Game Review
Miniatures Games
Speed Rally gives you the opportunity to use your kids’ 1/64 scale Hotwheels and Matchbox cars and pit them against each other in a fantastic auto race. You can think of Speed Rally as a cross between Car Wars and Formula De. It’s not nearly as combat intensive as Car Wars, but offers more trickery than the latter (which has no combat options at all).
Speed Rally is easily learned and quickly played and thus is an ideal game as a filler when your regular game ends early. Gamers can just leave the previous game’s terrain in place and designate points for an off-road rally. For more complicated races, there’s always the option of printing, pasting and cutting out track segments to create a road track course.
One of the most clever aspects of the game is the car design process. Author JP Trostle has identified a number of toy car type archetypes—the “Bug”, Muscle, Stock, Formula, Wacky and so on. When picking a car to race from your kid’s car box, you match the car against a silhouette in the rules to determine the general type. Then, you build the car with various racing modifications and weaponry. Each has a point value, so cars can be made evenly matched.
The points values generally work well, but we thought that the “double engine” option was a game imbalancer.
Players also need to create a driver. Each has two basic stats: Skill and Reaction. The basic driver score can be improved at a points cost. Other advantages can be purchased, and the costs offset with “disadvantages” as with the GURPS role playing games. There also are rules for a campaign game that lets you improve your driver over time.
What I did to speed setup was to use a spreadsheet to create a score of cars in different classes before the game. After each player chose a car from the box, we agree on what silhouette best represents the vehicle, and a random vehicle of that type is chosen.
In terms of the racing mechanisms, it feels a lot like the board game Formula De. Each gear in the car is assigned a dice size, from the D4 representing first gear to the D12 representing fifth. A roll on the d4 will move you one or two spaces; on the d6, two to four spaces; the d8, 4-7 and so on. The lowest roll on each die will move you the maximum for the previous gear. A chart is used to determine movement, but the author encourages players to make a special set from blank polyhedral dice.
Movement is measured by a standardized car length and width—1.5” x 3”. The rules recommend that you attach the cars to the bases with blue-tac and this works well. For races on a track, you simply move the required number of spaces. In free form games, there’s a special ruler that you can print out use.
Turning is done either in the curved marked spaces on track, or with a turning template. The tightness of a turn is restricted by the gear that the car is in. Trying to make a tighter turn requires a dice roll check against the driver’s skill.
As a basic driving game, Speed Rally is moderately fun. The good times really begin, however, when the “combat” elements are introduced. In addition to basic maneuvering, drivers also have the option of blocking or bashing passing cars by expending an action. Cars with weaponry can use the action to attack other players. Drivers also can use their action for defensive maneuvering.
Another nice touch in the game are options for playing on the floor of your living room. Rules are provided for driving on various types of flooring and furniture.
If there’s one thing I’d like to see done with the game, it’s having some more options to bump up the combat. While it was fun shooting machine guns and rockets, we didn’t inflict nearly enough damage to satisfy the more bloodthirsty players in our group.
Overall, I think this is a terrific game. At just $10 for the pdf, it’s an affordable buy—and you likely already have all the “miniatures” you need to play in your kids’ (or your own) Hot Wheels car box.
You can buy it at http://www.speedrally.net
Entry Permalink and Comments | Email this entry | List All Posts By Category
Didn't find what you wanted? Try our exclusive Miniature Wargaming Search Engine.
Comments:
No comments yet.