Pure Arcade Action

Every great racing game is built around three things: fast-paced action, excellent controls and of course, fun.

“Nail’d,” Deep Silver’s newest racer, has all three, in abundance.

Thanks to a wild assortment of tracks, a decent amount of unlockables and an amazing soundtrack, “nail’d” leaves the competition in the dust.

The design of the tracks in this game is easily its biggest selling point. Like a Thomas’ English Muffin, each track has its own nooks and crannies. Unlike most racing games, which feature linear track design, there are simply too many possibilities to describe on each track in “nail’d.” Full of twists and turns, back-roads and tons of jumps, this title plays unlike any racing game out right now.

The game’s sense of speed also helps make it a winner. With every successful landing [over a quarter of the time you’re playing, you’re actually in the air], and attack [you’re actually encouraged to hit your opponents], you receive boost points, which speed up the game- big time. All it takes is a press of the X button and all of a sudden, an already quick racing game goes supernova. With all the obstacles and 11 other racers on the track, managing your boosts in the tournament and exhibition becomes necessary in order to place high in each contest. In other game modes, which require you to inflict damage on the other ATVs and bikes, the boosts become even more important.

The online multi-player options are a blast as well. If you thought the game was frenetic enough, wait until you have 11 other racers intent on making sure you slam into every wall and crevasse. As mentioned before, each track has plenty of roads to take and at the same time, is filled with traps and sharp turns that make navigation incredibly tough, but tons of fun. On the strength of its course design alone, “nail’d” is easily one of the best games Deep Silver has ever produced.

While the courses are the main attraction here, the game is a good-looking one as well. The graphics are colorful and there are no noticeable drops in the frame rate while the game is at its quickest. Nice little graphical touches, such as mud and water hitting the screen while your racing make an already good-looking game extra pretty.

The soundtrack includes Queens of the Stone Age, Static-X and Hatebreed and gives the game an added edge. Nothing makes jumping through the air cooler than hearing some rocking tunes and this game is full of them. All in all, it’s another cool addition that makes this game something special.

Regardless of all of this, the game is hurt by a lack of a story mode or something more tangible to bring everything all together. After winning tournaments, you unlock new paint jobs and parts to customize your ATV or bike. While this adds more gameplay options and gives the game a longer shelf life, this game is designed specifically for the arcade racing fan.

As a result, if you’re looking for the type of gameplay experiences such as Gran Turismo or Forza provide, this isn’t the title for you.

However, if you’re all about non-stop action, online fun and pure speed, then this is the game for you.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 14230 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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