Night Runners Prologue vs Tokyo Xtreme Racer

[Doc]

I caught wind of Tokyo Xtreme Racer (TXR) when I first learned about Night Runners Prologue (NRP) and it made me speculate if one would beat out the other. I've got to put a few hours into both games and I was pleasantly surprised to see I enjoyed both for different reasons. I just wanted to highlighted the notable differences and similarities between the games and how these games don't feel to be in direct competition with each other, as they both feel to get chalked up to what you prefer.

Summary

Both NRP and TXR are arcade-sim racing games that focus on the JDM racing culture in Japan, racing against various drivers on Japan's highways. Both games offer a large amount of customization. NRP focuses more on an immersive world with stakes in your races, making you learn the map and weigh out what parts you want to use. TXR focuses on the many racers you go against, quickly getting you into races with linear and straight forward upgrades to your car.

Below will detail the similarities and differences fully to show how they handle each aspect differently rather than better or worse.

Similarities

Both these games offer the same following aspects: gameplay loop and car customization.

Gameplay Loop

NRP and TXR are arcade/ arcade-sim racing games that take place in the city centres of Japan. They showcase the Japanese Domestic Market (JDM) racing culture in Japan, with car selection featuring more affordable and moddable cars than luxury and sports car. The aim of both games is to rise the ranks of the local street-racer scene, initiating quick "Battles" with other races and their affiliated gangs to earn reputation and cash. Both games see you driving on the windy and confusing highways of Japan, while you weave through public traffic mid race. The highways feature everything from long runs to sharp turns and windy roads. Although certain cars and modifications will perform better in different sections of the map, your skill will ultimately dictate how well you navigate the map and its obstacles. Outside of the races, both games offer time trials and speed challenges you can do while driving out and about. As they are arcade-sim games, the car handling feels easy to learn, but hard to master. Crashes result in nothing but your car coming to a start and course correcting as needed.

Car Customization

NRP and TXR offer extensive car customization for players, as is indicative of the tuning and modding culture of the JDM scene. Cars have a large roster of parts that can be changed to improve performance to your liking and or bring out a striking car-body to show off to the world. Although TXR offers the ability to tune your components to give you precise control over your car's handling, NRP seems to have these features planned for its full release. This aspect may change into a major difference in the future however. Outside of physical changes, both games offer Livery stations to further push your car's appearance, with NRP giving the ability to import any liveries made using any editing software and TXR giving a detailed and large in-game tool to make your own liveries.

Differences

As was alluded to, despite the two games having the same gameplay loop with lots of customization to look forward to, NRP and TXR have major underlying differences that will make you question what style do you enjoy to play. Neither game does one aspect better or worse, rather have different philosophies on how they want to handle said aspects.

Car Customization

No, this isn't an error. Although both games give players a ton of customization, NRP and TXR handle customization differently. TXR's performance customization is done in a linear fashion as you buy higher level of parts for better performance. The levels are also not immediately available either, as you have to unlock the levels through the game's skill tree and beating certain racers. However, TXR does offer a large list of licensed cars to buy for base-line performances and the ability to tune your car's handling to your liking. The body customization is mostly for aesthetics, though there is speculation they can give minor changes to your cars performance.

NRP's customization asks you to weigh out the pros and cons of the parts you choose. You can immediately buy all the parts available for your car, provided you have the cash. But, every part affects your car in some way and all have trade offs. Having the best engine and nitro requires high cooling and engine strength. Else, that fast engine will quickly degrade to give you very poor performance. This also goes for body parts, as they affect your weight and downforce (for the love of weight, get rid of your back seats). So, your fancy bumpers and hoods can be a detriment if you aren't compromising elsewhere.

Race Battles and Losing

NRP and TXR showcase different aspects of the JDM style battles. They also put the stakes of losing in different weights.

NRP has classical race modes that players can expect. Battles are intiated by entering a parkade and calling up the owner of a parked car to challenge. Battles involve either being the first one to reach the end of a given long path, focusing on top speed, or winning the most rounds of short drag races, focusing on acceleration. Both races force you start at complete rest. So, you will have to learn how to launch well to get up to speed. Though the races are simple, the stakes for losing is high. Before you start a race, you and your opponent wager a large amount of money. When you first start out, the cash you lose comes from a betting pool, thus not touching your savings. But, once you clear that betting pool, losing will see you handing over the very cash you saved for parts and upgrades to your opponent, setting you back a hefty amount. This is somewhat mitigated when you get calls from people to take a loss for a bigger cash prize, which does come at the cost of losing reputation (though this has no major gameplay integration at the moment).

TXR sees you initiating SP races while you're driving, started by flashing your high beams behind your opponent. You and your opponent essentially have health bars. Your goal is to reduce your opponent's bar by being as far ahead of them as possible or forcing their car into crashes; the same going for your opponent. You'll start your races moving in 2nd gear, mostly behind your opponent. The style of driving will depend on your opponent, as they may focus on accelerating fast to win quickly or have a large top speed to beat you in the long run. They are also not afraid to play dirty and smash you into the curb. However, losing results in nothing happening at all, with the ability to try the race again a few seconds after. Since you can race past opponents, this gives you the ability to grind up for better parts and cars to eventually beat harder opponents.

The World

Although both games feature the JDM racing culture of Japan, this too is handled different in many small aspects. To summarize, NRP puts focus in world immersion, as it gives you a literal body to walk around the garage and race parkades. Every launch of the game forces you to start at your garage, thus you will always have to map out your route to go to the race parkades, time trial, and speed challenge spots. Time trials and speed challenges are built into the world too, as the speed challenges are about speeding through toll tickets to see how big of a ticket you get (yes, you are forced to pay the ticket). NRP also sets itself more in the 90s of Japan, shown in the sound track using DnB and Jungle beats and the visual filters looking like you are playing on a CRT. With the focus of immersion, the sense of adrenaline is a design focus, as visuals become blurred and the music becomes clear the faster you go. Races even start with a heart pumping cinematic with both cars driving up to the referee and launching at his signal. This also comes with the immersion of car maintenance and upkeep. It is nothing complex, but you are still forced to stop and pay for gas or end your night to do maintenance on your engine and oil.

TXR puts more focus on getting you in the action and battle the numerous racers. Although you have a garage, TXR lets you start at any highway entrance and which direction to drive. Once you've selected your starting point, you're dropped into the map immediately moving in third or fourth gear. You're always driving in one direction in a loop that is artificially dictated with flashing arrows. Some of these blockades will be removed to offer new paths as you progress. A race is never far away, as there are many racers to find on the road to challenge by flashing your high-beams, which the game takes less than a minute to give a flashy intro and immediately start the race moving. You can even race the public traffic, from regular cars to taxis to delivery trucks. With the focus on getting you into races, the music is high tempo of a mix of genres, from rock to eurobeat. With that focus, the UI is more on the functional side and aesthetics are kept clean. Although TXR also has car upkeep, it only comes in the form of tire degradation and NOS refuel, which is replenished for free when you return to your garage. Surprisingly, there is a light story that progresses as you beat harder racers, and each boss racer has their own soundtrack to race against. With that story, every single racer is given a sense of personality with a race title, custom livery and gang insignia, and a backstory you can choose to read.

Conclusions

Hopefully this shows how neither NRP or TXR is better than the other. Rather, hopefully this gives a good enough break down to see what aspects you like more to play. Personally, I love both games. Both games feel good to handle and offer a large level of challenge and plenty of customization. I enjoy NRP for how it presents the JDM world and the level of thought it asks of you when customizing your car, as it's not simply "make car go fast and look cool". I enjoy TXR for the numerous challenges you can quickly pick from and pursue, along with the simpler and tuneable customization the game offers. I personally will be continuing with TXR until we get substantial updates to NRP.

[Pvt Tommy]

Maybe TXR is easier to play?

I feel like NRP has a bit of a barrier of entry for new players (which includes myself). I don't really know how to find missions and when I do, it's typically a time trial that I typically fail at because I don't really know how to navigate the highways of Tokyo that well.

In the end, I just end up driving around until I get bored and stop playing. The game looks awesome but I've never gotten into an actual race in the game.

Just my perspective as a new player.

[Mike Snowpants]

Originally posted by Pvt Tommy:

Maybe TXR is easier to play?

I feel like NRP has a bit of a barrier of entry for new players (which includes myself). I don't really know how to find missions

in NRP, the missions are always at the PA (parking areas), so just head to those and you'll find your races

[Doc]

Originally posted by Pvt Tommy:

Maybe TXR is easier to play?

I feel like NRP has a bit of a barrier of entry for new players (which includes myself). I don't really know how to find missions and when I do, it's typically a time trial that I typically fail at because I don't really know how to navigate the highways of Tokyo that well.

Just my perspective as a new player.

I can believe that TXR is easier for those reasons. In NRP, out of the very brief tutorial, you have to remember to find the Tatsumi PA (PA) on the map (keep tapping left or right on the D-Pad until you find the parkade), make a waypoint, and drive over there to do any of the races (make sure to hit left on the D-pad to open the minimap and see the highlighted route). And after every race, you'll end up in a different location and need to navigate back to the parkade to do more races. Some of the routes can be confusing too, as you are sometimes required to drive into oncoming traffic to get to your locations.

TXR however, when you are selecting which highway entrance to start at, you have a clear table of objectives you can pursue. Selecting one of your objectives will take you to closest entrance to drive and find. But, because there are no locations to stop at, you will quickly find your objective driving in the same direction as you. The map you drive on is always in one large loop that follows traffic, so you will eventually find one of your many objectives to complete. And the map nicely marks what objectives you have and haven't completed.

So, in terms of game flow and finding things to do, TXR certainly is easier to get you into the game. But, that difficulty of NRP does reduce the more you play the game and become familiar with the route. Plus, there is only one place to start races, and starting races once you get there is clear cut; find a sporty car within your rep and give them a call. So, it becomes more of a matter of routine. When it comes to the actual races and gameplay, I feel both games have approachable racing that is easy to start but naturally becomes harder with the bigger races. And with the free roam nature of the games, you will have ample opportunities to learn how to take sharp turns and weave through traffic effectively.

[Pvt Tommy]

Also after reading some guides on NRP, using automatic cars is just not viable which stinks for me as I typically don't like using manual in arcadey racing games. Just another barrier of entry for newer players, especially those that are more casual towards racing.

[Doc]

Originally posted by Pvt Tommy:

Also after reading some guides on NRP, using automatic cars is just not viable which stinks for me as I typically don't like using manual in arcadey racing games.

Ah, yeah. Unfortunately, that is an issue in TXR as well. Although TXR has the ability to turn any car into manual or automatic, and the numerous cars means you can find a fast car to drive in automatic, you will eventually hit a wall by cars with faster acceleration. Automatic transmission is unfortunately inefficient to get up to speed, as the gears change at low RPMs. This means that the top speed is compounded with poor acceleration with each underlying gear change.

I am by far not a racing game player either. These two games really have been my only main ventures into racing games, and it's only because of its showcase of the JDM culture nicely (I like car aesthetics more than cars itself). So, having to learn driving manually was a jarring experience, and still is. But, being these games are arcade-sim games, the manual drive is a lot more forgiving (thank god for no stalling). I'm sure I can be a lot of effective with my manual driving, but I simply change gears up when I hit the redline on my RPM, and drop down gears and use the brake on sharp turns. My playstyle has basically been to bash my head in till I get comfortable enough with the car I'm using.

[(.)(.)]

For me the moment its arcade focused it feels pointless to even play.

Whats the point of a tuning menu and upgrades when the ai play by arcade racer rules that often results in having to cheese the ai to win.

[Doc]

Originally posted by (.)(.):

For me the moment its arcade focused it feels pointless to even play.

Whats the point of a tuning menu and upgrades when the ai play by arcade racer rules that often results in having to cheese the ai to win.

I would tuning and upgrades in both games is to help with handling to your liking than purely to beat the opponents. Fast acceleration, large top speeds, drifty tires, etc. That all said, it's still very arcadey in that driving controls is simplified and you don't know what your opponent has in terms of power and speed, especially in NRP where every car uses the same body kit currently. Txr has some leeway, where the specific car models can dictate its top speed. So, I'll always know a Trueno caps out at 151km/h.

I haven't found myself needing to cheese races to win currently. There have been times where forcing me opponent to crash has net me the win, but it also has gotten me losses. I found myself losing more because my car is not fast enough or I made a mistake with traffic or turns.

That all said, if you're looking more for a more simulation racing game of the setting, a new game just released a demo to try: JDM - Japanese Drift Masters. Exact same setting but a lot more realistic handling. There's a clear skill ceiling to reach and an infinitely higher one to strive for with the windy drift courses and similar highway heavy traffic. I would give that a go, if you haven't yet.

[Archbishop Desmond Calorie]

Night Runners not looking so good right now tbh.

Completely overdesigned in some aspects, and completely underdesigned in others.
The entire walking element and TV screen aesthetic(but only for select screens!) is completely unnecessary. I take a simple menu any day.

And at least from the prologue, the entire racing part feels like a low cost knock-off of TXR.

Hopefully the full release will at least fix the latter, but as it is: oof.

[Doc]

Originally posted by Calorie Mate:

Completely overdesigned in some aspects, and completely underdesigned in others.
The entire walking element and TV screen aesthetic(but only for select screens!) is completely unnecessary. I take a simple menu any day.

And at least from the prologue, the entire racing part feels like a low cost knock-off of TXR.

Yeah, I do find the menus in NRP cumbersome to navigate, especially the parts store page. I much prefer TXR's where your selections and stat changes are all in areas. And the map is just objectively not good to navigate around, especially compared to TXR's map and seeing where every racer is.

I personally don't mind the walking; I enjoy being able to take in my car or immerse myself in the dark parkade. But I wish the walking sections were faster, especially when going around the parkades. I also don't mind the CRT aesthetics; I feel that's one of its selling points over the highly crisp and realistic graphics of every other racing game out there. However, I do find the low draw distance and the blurring when you bump your car really difficult to manage when trying to dodge traffic, especially on coming traffic.

The racing aspect I feel is different enough from TXR that I feel it helps NRP stand out more. I do feel it's not utilizing its mechanics fully, but that may be an EA thing. But right now, the reputation system has no purpose in NRP, even though they make it out to feel like it, making it feel more like a generic racer. So, I would love to see that be fleshed out fully to see the repercussions of having high and low rep. As for the races themselves, I have been finding the strategies between NRP and TXR to be different because of their design. Since NRP has a traditional finish line, I often find myself relying on high top speed to win, often seeing myself fall behind initially only to catch up later on. But with TXR, that doesn't work most times. I've had a lot of races where my top speed will see me catching up to my opponents. But, by the time I reach them, my health bar has depleted and I've lost the race. And since part upgrades are locked behind story progression in TXR, I find myself switching to a high acceleration car instead.

So, overall, I find NRP and TXR's race structure to be very different to warrant playing both. But I do agree that interfacing with NRP can be clunky and some of the key mechanics it presents need more depth added.

[Pvt Tommy]

Originally posted by Calorie Mate:

Night Runners not looking so good right now tbh.

Completely overdesigned in some aspects, and completely underdesigned in others.
The entire walking element and TV screen aesthetic(but only for select screens!) is completely unnecessary. I take a simple menu any day.

And at least from the prologue, the entire racing part feels like a low cost knock-off of TXR.

Hopefully the full release will at least fix the latter, but as it is: oof.

Nooooo, I like the walking and TV element. It is what makes Nightrunners NIGHT-RUNNERS.

Aesthetics/art direction do a lot for a video game.

[NvMe 令]

Originally posted by Calorie Mate:

Night Runners not looking so good right now tbh.

Completely overdesigned in some aspects, and completely underdesigned in others.
The entire walking element and TV screen aesthetic(but only for select screens!) is completely unnecessary. I take a simple menu any day.

And at least from the prologue, the entire racing part feels like a low cost knock-off of TXR.

Hopefully the full release will at least fix the latter, but as it is: oof.

This, the menus are honestly a huge headache and very confusing. A more intuitive system where you can quickly upgrade and swap parts would be better

[ReIntegration]

As mentioned in another post. NRP and SRP were completely inspired by TXR. If TXR never existed we wouldn’t have NR or SRP. Why compare a game that was birthed from the other?

[Doc]

Originally posted by ReIntegration:

NRP and SRP were completely inspired by TXR. If TXR never existed we wouldn’t have NR or SRP. Why compare a game that was birthed from the other?

I more wanted to create the post to help highlight how NRP offers its own experience from its inspirations. For all the reasons listed above, I do feel NRP and TXR are very different games, despite using the same setting and map (it's the Tokyo Highway, can't say one is copying the other here). Different players would enjoy different aspects, or be disinterests in others. I personally enjoy both for different reasons, as stated above. So, I am more than happy to exemplify what each game does well and I'll be playing both of them.

[ReIntegration]

Exactly, I love TXR and absolutely Love NR and enjoy SRP. I’m glad we have all three. NR is gritty and low key underground compared to TXR but in the end we are blessed with these works of art. We also have Japanese Drift Masters too coming!

[Doc]

Originally posted by ReIntegration:

Exactly, I love TXR and absolutely Love NR and enjoy SRP. I’m glad we have all three. NR is gritty and low key underground compared to TXR but in the end we are blessed with these works of art. We also have Japanese Drift Masters too coming!

Yes! I mentioned Japanese Drift Masters in a past comment; I will most likely pass on it because I am too much of a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ to handle the sim controls lol. But, I'm glad to see a more sim-racing game for the JDM scene, since both TXR and NRP are more arcade-y. And, as someone who has never played a racing game till now, I have been finding them great entries to jump in with, with NRP having more thought and weight to your customization and TXR feeling straight-forward and tight with its challenges.