If you’ve ever wanted to race around parking garages all over the US (and Europe if you get the DLC), then Parking Garage Rally Circuit is for you.  Race around parking garages in all sorts of locations in this silly throwback racer that feels like a PSOne game!  It’s available on Switch and PC, but reviewed on Switch here.

Play control is pretty standard.  L stick steers and shoulder trigger buttons brake and gas.  If you hold down the Y button while turning, you’ll do a drift and if you do it long enough and come out of the turn, you’ll do a boost.  There are single player and local multiplayer modes as well.

In single player, you can race on eight tracks based on locations in the US. And there are three different classes to race on that you can unlock (light, medium, and heavy).   But since they are all in parking garages, there isn’t very much variety.  Just a lot of 90 degree turns in parking garages.  Feels like you’re racing in one of those toy car service stations like one I had when I was little.  They do TRY to make things different in each race.  Like having you go on the roof of the garage and seeing a snippet of Mount Rushmore.  And I do remember the Seattle Airport parking garage having a lot of those spiraly ramps and you must also avoid luggage trucks, too.

Aside from the lack of variety, my other main problem is the high level of difficulty.  It was a struggle to get second place most of the time, and I don’t know how you get first place!  And since placing is how you unlock new tracks, that was a big standstill for me. I also don’t like that half the game was behind a paywall (the Europe tracks DLC).   Some people may not like the low res PSOne styled graphics, but I thought they were kind of charming.  But I’d still rather play other PSOne racing games like Ridge Racer Type 4.

Kid Factor:

Nothing too violent or objectionable here.  Your cars can crash and flip and toss around, but they just look like toys.  Reading skill is helpful for the text, and younger gamers may find it too difficult.  Parking Garage Rally Circuit is rated E for Everyone.

Tags: Game Reviews