This or Inertial Drift?

[FireShark]

Which one do you think is better overall?

[Karma]

I wanted Inertial Drift but I don't have a controller and playing on the keyboard is awfull

[Leigh]

While they do tend to lean in different directions, they do touch base on some of the same elements at the same time.

I would say, if you don't mind the SCI-FI look and the lack of a full grid of cars, then Inertial Drift is better.

It hits all the Ridge Racer tick boxes (and, by extention, other racers of the 90s such as Daytona, Virtua etc) and it really didn't even try to. Narrow, winding courses through beautiful retro cell-shaded environments, easy to learn/hard to master drift mechanics, each car is DRASTICALLY different in feel, you don't see much of the characters so they cannot annoy you like the Hotshot ones do. I just feel it is a better package.

But, if it doesn't float your boat, Slipstream is an awesome Outrun clone if motorway racing suits you. Speaking of Outrun, Outrun 2 Coast to Coast with the FXT Mod is fantastic fun. Got it set up today and it gives so much a better experience than this title.

I picked up Hotshot, refunded after 40 mins, gave it a second chance, played for 45 mins, refunded it again. I can't put Inertial Drift down, only to like, eat, sleep, go to the toilet, and continue my Trails in the Sky playthrough. Otherwise I'd be in ID 24/7.

The design philosophy of Hotshot need a major overhaul in my mind, the course environments are beautiful and detailed, but the tracks are flat, wide, and forgettable. Compare it to the RR series or Daytona and it just pales in comparison.

There is a Demo of ID, called Sunset Prologue, try it out. And, quite honestly, I still get a lot of enjoyment out of my Ridge Racer CDs on an emulator, and the PSP titles. Great fun all these years on.

[VexTary]

I played both games for a good amount of hours. Hotshot Racing is a good game, but Inertial Drift is absolutely fantastic.

Keep in mind that Inertial Drift is pretty challenging, and has the unique twin-stick drifting mechanic. Each car not only has different stats, but also handle drift differently, which makes each of them unique.

It's challenging, but when you finally master the car, and the tracks, it feels REALLY good. One of my best purchases for sure.

[JapanGamer29]

FYI: If you haven't tried Inertial Drift, there's a demo on Steam called "Inertial Drift: Sunset Prologue", which has its own store page.

[ZooL]

it depends on what you are looking for. if you want a game that feels like the old arcade racers hotshot is 10 times better than ID.

ID is its own thing and while it is a good game it also has its flaws. if you are completely honest ID is just a big time trial. there is no collision in the game (they explain by saying the cars phase shift) and you always face one opponent only so no matter if you do an actual ghost race, a rave or a duel it feals nearly the same. just the win condition changes slightly. but it will always be a race against one other car which you cannot touch. People also tend to glorify the different cars in ID. it just boils down to different difficult levels because the cars that are harder to control are simply the faster ones. to explain better, lets take a look at the 4 starter cars: first car is easy mode, you can just drift every corner be keep on the gas and just using drift stick, second car needs you to let go of the gas a little for sharper turns, the third car will only properly enter a drift if you let go of the gas and if you start hitting the gas too early at the end of a drift you will loose control and the last cars is just the same only more extreme, where you will completely spin out if you hit the gas too early before the drift was completed. but each of them is much faster than the one before. The compaign of ID feels longer than hosthot, but that is just because they make your race the same track 3-4 events before you move on. so it is not as great as people make it out to be.

hotshot on the other hand has great driving physics from the get go and all cars feel slightly different. I think the biggest mistake people make is not understanding that the difficulty levels are also speed classes like in mario kart. so normal is like 50cc and expert is like 150cc. So if you play on normal, yes every track will feel wide and boring. if you ever played a mario kart on 50cc with no items then you will exactly know what to expect. But once you start racing at expert aka 150cc (thats why both online mm modes are locked to expert) the game becomes much more challenging and the tracks feel challenging enough and some corners just become a blast to drift perfectly. i also don't know what people have been smoking when they complain about the track layouts being to flat and/or wide compared to old arcade games. Daytona USA, Ridge Racer and Outrun 2 (just to name a few) have tracks which are similar in width and height variations. it think people just never played them in years and are imagining things. Once again, on normal aka 50cc the tracks feel super wide and boring, but thats just them picking the wrong speed class.
yes, i wish there were a handful of really challenging tracks, but the devs said there are working on a new cup as a free dlc so my hopes are high that those will be the expert tracks.
Apart from that Hotshot has some fun game modes that ID really lacks and the multiplayer is much more enjoyable because there are 8 players and actual interaction between the players.

[Azaleh]

To add to what has already being said by others, it also depend if you're interested in online multiplayer or not, Hotshot provide multiplayer, Interntial is only local AFAIK.

[Leigh]

Originally posted by Azaleh:

To add to what has already being said by others, it also depend if you're interested in online multiplayer or not, Hotshot provide multiplayer, Interntial is only local AFAIK.

Incorrect, it has online head to head and leaderboards.

[ZooL]

i think the actual question is: are you a person who likes to race several people head to head with interaction (hotshot) or if you are more into time trials,ghosts and shaving off the last ms of your track time(ID).

[infernogott]

Why not both?

[Tetrafish_21]

I seen a vid for ID, and it seems like it has you throwing the back end of your car to drift... Something that doesn't seem natural with mere gas and brake pedals. Then again, it could just be some crazy handling on whatever car was being used in the vid.

I'm fine without it.

[Azaleh]

Originally posted by Lei:

Originally posted by Azaleh:

To add to what has already being said by others, it also depend if you're interested in online multiplayer or not, Hotshot provide multiplayer, Interntial is only local AFAIK.

Incorrect, it has online head to head and leaderboards.

I see, taht's good to know, but it's not specified on their store page then, it says
"Single-player
Shared/Split Screen PvP
Full controller support
Remote Play Together"

while on Hotshot it's clearly specified
"Single-player
Online PvP
Shared/Split Screen PvP
Online Co-op
Shared/Split Screen Co-op
Remote Play Together"

[ZooL]

Originally posted by Tetrafish_21:

I seen a vid for ID, and it seems like it has you throwing the back end of your car to drift... Something that doesn't seem natural with mere gas and brake pedals. Then again, it could just be some crazy handling on whatever car was being used in the vid.

I'm fine without it.

it is actually like you say. it makes no sense with brake and gas alone. thats why they came up with a cleverl explanation: every car has a futuristic high mass gyroscope at the back which you control with the right stick. so in a scifi way it all makes sense :-) they even show it in the games intro.