But Free!
Welcome Time Wasters!
This week I played Super Tux Cart, an unfinished game that has been floating around the net for awhile.
Super Tux Cart is a racing game that takes a lot from the Mario Kart series. The major difference between the two games is that Super Tux Cart doesn’t feature Mario characters, but instead has many mascots of open source programs as the playable characters.
Super Tux Cart is a great racing game. As I’ve said, it takes a lot from Mario Kart. It actually plays a lot like Mario Kart 64, which is my favorite in the series. Carts are controls with the arrow keys and players can use nitro and weapons to aid them in races. Nitro and weapons can be picked up along the track. Weapons are found in gift-wrapped boxes and nitro is found in blue tubes. Players can also drift to build up small boost and go around tighter turns.
Super Tux Cart sports story, single player and multiplayer modes. Single player has players completing a series of races. I assume multiplayer is about the same, or that there is a battle mode, but I was unable to get it working. Story mode was easily the best part of the game and allows players to drive around an open area and complete challenges to unlock more races and characters.
One thing I really enjoyed about Super Tux Cart was its interesting race tracks that were filled with secrets and alternative routes. It reminded me of playing Mario Kart 64 and going off the track in Royal Raceway to explore Princess Peach’s castle. The open area was also nice and the lack of invisible walls made it interesting to just drive around and look at the scenery.
One part of Super Tux Cart that isn’t overly amazing is the audio. I am impressed that the game has a lot of different songs, but more often than not the songs aren’t catchy enough to be remembered or they aren’t upbeat enough to fit the game.
Super Tux Cart’s sound effects aren’t all that grand either. This isn’t to say that they are bad, but the sound used for the carts’ engine wore on me after a while.
Overall, I really like Super Tux Cart. The game isn’t finished yet, but it already offers a lot of gameplay. I was disappointed that I couldn’t get multiplayer working, but the story mode was really fun. Its openness was also something that I really enjoyed. The game didn’t make me feel like I was on rails like a lot of racing games seem to do. My only real complaint with the game is its audio. Here’s hoping the game gets even better before it’s finished!
Super Tux Cart races its way to 3.5 GiN Gems out of 5!