If you played video games in the early 2000s during the sixth-generation consoles era of PS2, original Xbox, Nintendo Gamecube and Sega Dreamcast, you’ll likely have played, or at least be aware of, street racing games. What if there’s a new game that looks and plays like that, keeping that Y2K tuning car scene vibe of those games in tact?
Indie devs Team Sealime has revealed a game doing just that: Heatwarped.
Heatwarped will see you take on the underground racing scene in the city of Ratfield. Customise cars, roam the open world in your blinged up ride tacked with neon kits and exposed carbon fibre bonnets (hoods, if you prefer the American English term, which many do). You even have a PDA, a proto-smartphone for those that were not around before the advent of iPhone, to organise races with other racers through a racing forum.
Take a look at the trailer of Heatwarped and you can clearly tell that it wants to be the spiritual successor to Need For Speed Underground 2 and its contemporaries.
The city of Ratfield has that same vibe of Palmont City or even Olympic City of the original NFS Underground. The roads are curiously wide with those glowy chevrons appearing that acts as an invisible wall to guide you through the racing layout. There’s only four cars competing in each race. And the brake lights have that trailing effect when you hit the nitrous, an iconic aesthetic trick Need For Speed games often use to sell that sense of speed, especially the ones from the 2000s.
Also, a good number of from-the-presskit screenshots available for Heatwarped are rendered in a 4:3 aspect ratio, which is a nice touch.
Heatwarped isn’t just here to announce some nostalgia baiting game. The team dropped a demo which you can download through Steam or through a standalone installer available on the game’s site, which close enough resembles the style of websites from 20 years ago (complimentary).
There’s been quite a number of indie racing games that currently available or in development. Another recent gem we discovered is Kaido Genkai, a love letter to Choro-Q and Auto Modellista.
The other popular indie racer with a demo, Nightrunners, has been in development for some time that the dormant racing game series it was homaging, Tokyo Xtreme Racer, has since reemerged and released. The list of indie racing games don’t end there, this is just to name a few standouts still in development.
Heatwarped has no release date yet, but it’s coming to PC (Steam). A demo is available.