Universal Mini Motor Racing (By The Binary Mill)

It still boggles the mind when individuals need to discuss a $2 price difference for such a polished and well supported game (forum discussion, fast patch addressing issues, etc).

This $4 game lasts longer than a tall caramel macchiato from Starbucks. Yesh.

 

MINI MOTOR RACING is one of the nominees for Touch Arcade Game of the Week.

Do you like this vibrant super-charged racing game?
If you think MINI MOTOR RACING deserves to be the winner of TAGOTW, give it your vote now!

[thread=115735]VOTE HERE[/thread]

 

I wish the vote for it would be delayed till the patch comes out. I think more people would be able to enjoy it then and subsequently give it a vote.

 

Agreed, i can't place my vote as frustrated as i've been the last few days. I really want to love it, but the glitches and bugs really make for a frustrating experience. It has the potential to be a top shelf game, but unfortunately the lack of beta testing has costed this developer many fans. Which is a shame, they really did a great job on the first half of the game.

Hopefully the update gets approved soon.

 

Yes, the first race seems really cool. If only I could get to the 2nd, I believe this would be my GoTW.

 

I voted! Well worth it. At least it's a little glitch that's stopping me fro
Continue where as the over hyped IB 2 still has me scared of playing cause I feel like as soon as I reach level 10 again, my game will reset like its happened the last 3 times!

Btw favorite thing to happen in MMR: cars pile up in a hairpin turn and my car ends up on top of an AI car and it drives me around.

Best once a lifetime glitch to happen in MMR: On cliff, I and AI drivers boosted up the hill, my car landed on other AI cars and some how bounced off and landed vertically on the castle(or what ever it is) and started driving up the wall (I swear I'm not making it up) and eventually was reset after driving to the top of the wall.

This game is awesome!

 

A few months ago during development (before Cliffs existed), I boosted with Nitro at the sweet spot on Island track and jumped clean over the sign, made my day

 

Game Impressions

I’m an ardent reader of literature and while it may seem strange that I bring this up in reviewing a racing game, “A Tale of Two Cities” rings true in the instance of Mini Motor Racing by Binary Mill. Not that the game is set during the French Revolution or has “bloody” battles, MMR is at times a potentially great top-down racer presented with engaging gameplay and wonderful animation. Other times, frustration comes from an over-the-top AI and system optimization issues. Don’t get me wrong, MMR is a solid offering if you’re a fan of the genre, but play it with a touch of patience.

Visually speaking, MMR stands helmet and belt harness above other racers with animations that pop off the screen. Whether playing on an iPod Touch or better yet, an iPad, and you’ll see what I mean. The tracks look amazing from the skid marks on hairpin turns to the expelled dust from fast spinning tires. The race cars themselves all exhibit detailed markings that frankly look great both close up and during gameplay.

The specs on MMR…you won’t need to worry about variety when it comes to the vehicles you’ll be driving. There are 13 cars to choose from (some are unlocked as you progress through the races)—LeMans, Hatchback, LeDorean, Sleigh, Bus, Sedan, Hot Rod, Buggy, Sprint, Sports, Fruit Ninja, Big Rig, and Pickup—each with their own unique attributes in the areas of handling, nitro, acceleration, and top speed.

The game offers two modes: Career and Quick Race. Career is made up of 17 cups, each involving 4 races. Some of the cups have more than one circuit. For example, the Fruit Ninja Cup has 3 circuits meaning you’ll need to complete 12 tracks to complete that cup.

The objective of each race is to place in the top three resulting in a gold, silver or bronze trophy and prize money. The money can then of course be used to soup up your vehicles in handling, nitro, acceleration and top speed. A running total of earnings is displayed when you return to the menu. And, as you complete circuits by finishing in the top three, additional cups or leagues will unlock. Once unlocked, these tracks become available in Quick Race, a mode that allows you to practice driving maneuvers or just to get familiar with the tracks. On that note, MMR also has a Multiplayer which unfortunately is limited only to local wifi and Bluetooth play. Hopefully, online multiplayer will be available in future updates.

Off to the gameplay…the devs behind MMR really deliver an exhilarating racing experience which in the plethora of top down racers available on the platform is saying something. While it’s easy enough to say that the tracks themselves are varied enough with hairpin turns, sharp angles, and treacherous curves, MMR’s tracks provide visually stunning backgrounds. For example, Alpine provides long jumps, rocky terrain and a steep uphill climb, while Safari offers a dusty terrain surrounded by an oasis of vegetation and water streams. On the other hand, Tarmac is a race full of curves, while the Docks is all about weaving in and around warehouses in an industrial setting. One of may favorites is the Fruit Ninja track because it has sharp angles and splotches of smashed fruit which affect acceleration and speed as you drive through it. All of this of course is accompanied by catchy soundtracks that you’ll either enjoy or find irritating.

In any racing game, the controls are make or break, and for me, I found them spot on in MMR. MMR has a number of control options from left/right buttons to a steering slider, but the only scheme that worked effectively is the steering wheel. Used in conjunction with the accelerator button (you can also play with auto acceleration), MMR’s controls are spot on. Because you can buy upgrades for your vehicle, tweaking handling and top speed actually helps with making precise steering as you progress through the cups.

In the initial circuits and races, the game is relatively easy, and I managed to place first in my first 8 races without making any upgrades to my LeMans. Experimenting with other vehicles, I found that the different attributes do impact driving which is a good thing. For example, turning on a dime with the Big Rig led to spin outs, while the Buggy has a good straightaway acceleration. Because the controls make MMR relatively accessible to anyone—they’re easy to use—you can experiment with different driving maneuvers such as ramming or nudging other cars out of the way or cutting corners when possible. Part of the challenge is that the top down views change as you progress through Career mode. But the devs do a great job of providing just the right camera views as the vehicles move through the tracks.

During races, money and nitro boosts randomly appear on the track, which comes in handy. Nitro boosts provide quick shots of acceleration that you’ll need to strategically use during races especially in the later cups…more on that in a minute. There’s nothing like flying through the air with a nitro boost. Money picked up during the race is added to your purse upon finishing a race.

With the good comes the not so good…remember I told you it was a tale of two cities. In the initial races, the AI of competing racers generally feels balanced with a few exceptions. There are issues with competitors hitting their nitro at inopportune times and crashing right into a curve or crashing on the side of the road. Later on, however, this becomes a bigger issue when competitors start intentionally crashing in your vehicle. It almost felt like a demolition derby with a pinch of road rage to boot. None of this was more apparent than at the start of a race when almost all the competing vehicles smash and box into your car. Other times, multiple cars engage their nitro to ram full speed into your car, sometimes hard enough to flip you over. You almost feel like a big bull’s-eye has been painted on your car, and it certainly adds to the challenge of the game depending on your point of view. One tip I will provide is to use your nitro—even several times—right out of the gate to create some separation.

Another form of crashing involves the game itself. Running MMR on my iPad, the game sometimes closed out completely without recording results from my race. This became more of an issue in the more difficult races later on when I would manage to squeeze out a victory in a tough race only to have the game quit without recording my victory. I’m not sure what kind of testing was done prior to the game’s release, but it obviously wasn’t enough. The devs have submitted a new update that hopefully addresses the crashing and AI issues. Let’s just hope they tested the update to ensure that it doesn’t wipe out career progress.

Overall, MMR is a good top-down racer, and probably the best looking one in the genre, that could have been great. The controls make the game accessible to anyone, while the gameplay provides an engaging racing experience. The cars and the tracks should keep gamers coming back for more if they can put aside the crashing issues for the time being.

Albie Meter: 4 stars (great gameplay coupled with equally great visuals and track variety; controls are easy to learn; inconsistent AI in later races; would be 5 stars if not for the all too frequent game optimization issues)

 

Fair review and I love the fact that the AI become very dangerous in the later races. They definitely keep me on my wheels and sometimes they do take themselves out also which is always fun to watch!

 

So I just updated my iOS from 4.3.3 to 5.0.1, lost everything I have done in this game so far..... all upgrades, all gold race wins.. EVERYTHING!!!!!!! Son of a #$%^%&(

apart from that, I love this game!!

(it seems to be the only game that lost all my progress, so far all other apps still have where I was up to..??)

 

I was going to bring this up...I'm on iOS 5.0(.0) and the game won't save my data. If the app actually quits, every time I open it I'm back to square one :/

 

my bro's having the same problem too and he's on ios 5 and has an iphone 4 too, so there must be a connection...

 

Pocket Gamer really agree with us.

I agree. Let's hope update will fix all of those issues.

@Devs: true, Duke Nukem Forever roadmap is not a good example, but... better safer than faster

 

Great review, thanks for effort.

 

I thought batman was game of the week, I guess for this week? Yes def.... It's gotta be one if the best games I've ever downloaded, the crashing issue is a tottaly different thing and if fixed it should def be game of the week, although it's a close one beetween this and stretched both top tier games... So I guess it depends on how soon this update is and then a better final judgement can be made...

Edit* nvm I thoufht I read app store game but ya it's TA gotw I had to with hold my vote though.... Need that update...

 

Tested a bit more...uninstalled and reinstalled the app as well.

Definitely will not save any data. Achievements register fine, although like others I've gotten the achievement for getting gold in all events despite the fact I've gotten nowhere near the end game. No data is ever saved. Lost upgrades/race progression so many times that I'm not even trying to play the game any more.

Looked and saw no mention of this in the 1.1 patch notes, so...I guess if the devs have any more questions, just ask here or shoot me a message and I'll do what I can to help.

It's a shame, because I really enjoy the game! I'd love to be able to get to races where I'm not lapping everybody else on the grid by the end of the race.

 

Wow pocketgamer gave it a 5/10. Thats abit harsh but i have to agree with many of their points.

 

Just wait until you lap an opponent and they pass you by only to take first place. I don't know how it happens, but i've had that happen a few times. Somehow the game forgets you are an entire lap ahead of them :/ At first i thought maybe my mind was playing tricks on me, but its happened on numerous occasions, so i'm assuming its just another bug.

 

It seems like you simply enjoy to bash this game now going from your rant about update never submitted to pocket gamer's (a site no one cares about) low score. Only an idiot reviewer would give this a 5/10 but I'm pretty sure they probably gave IB2 a ten right?

Anyway, there is no bug that makes a lapped opponent first. The AI drivers many time drive similar cars, so just because you lapped one Sprint, doesn't mean the other one that passed you right near the finish line was the same one. Also besides the wheel bug and the occasional getting stuck in random places, there's nothing disappointing about this game.

If Real Racing 2 is the best Sim racer in the AppStore, this is the best arcade/mini cars racer in that category. Even the mighty Death Rally has nothing on MMR.