A decent spiritual successor to Rollcage?
GRIP is a futuristic combat racer inspired by the Rollcage games from 1999/2000. Combine furious speed with intense action to create memorable racing moments.
I never played the Rollcage games, but I’ve dabbled with other fast racers like Wipeout and F-Zero over the years and with a lack of an F-Zero game for a number of years (Damn you Nintendo) I’d hope this might fill the void, but was I right?
In some ways, yes. GRIP is fast, high-octane action and surprisingly easy to get to grips with (if you’ll pardon the pun) as despite the high-speed, your vehicle will always propel forward regardless of if it seems that you’ve landed upside-down or not, it’s impressive to have the level of control with the speed and combat, plus it looks pretty snazzy too.
It’s typical arcade action and it works well, though despite the control you’re still bound to do a bit of crashing from time to time, which could cost you the entire race, but that’s nothing new when it comes to speedy racers like this. The letdown is that the AI can be seriously overpowered at times, I’d say borderline cheating which is disappointing, but maybe a patch could improve things.
There’s a good amount of content to be found and races online are done well, there’s a nice variety of modes and content to get your teeth stuck into. Performance-wise, GRIP looks superb and runs at a steady framerate. Load times are mixed, while the soundtrack is typical of an arcade racer and enjoyable to listen to as a result.
The Verdict
On the whole, GRIP is unpolished but functional. It just needs a bit of extra TLC and it could easily contend with it’s rivals. As a spiritual successor, it does what you’d expect and though not perfect, it still does it well.