Drift21 Preview (Steam Early Access)

by Jim Smale · September 9, 2020

Tune your dream drift car, change parts, boost performance, and show your skills on Japan’s legendary EBISU circuits! Take the car to your garage, where you can make major modifications to it. Replace engine, suspension, and exhaust parts yourself to achieve the right performance for your driving style! With visual tuning – change body kits, paint color, and decals – you’ll create a drift car that’s one of a kind.

Pros:

Decent graphics.
Download size.
Controller support.
Graphics-Resolution, quality preset, anti-aliasing, framerate, v-sync, Fov slider for the garage, real-time mirrors, and motion blur.
3 controller input support-keyboard, controller, and steering wheel.
Controller settings-auto gearbox/clutch, engine stalls, invert axis and sensitivity sliders, dead zone sliders, and the force needed to apply for brakes and acceleration.
Five save slots.
Optional tutorial.
Car drifting gameplay.
Two modes-single player and quick race.
Garage-first person view, you can buy/upgrade/fit/unfit car parts and use the tools and lifts in the garage.
Dyno-hook your car up to it and get a readout on performance.
Missing parts button-handy button that shows any pieces you are missing and clicking them takes you to the shop listing for said parts.
Warehouse-in game shop for parts covering-complete engines, engine, pipes, gearbox, drive train, exhaust, suspension, steering, brakes, rims, tires, car body, interior, and other.
Interact with your car by fitting parts.
Events-you, choose the car, track, mode, and any of the set challenges.
Mode-3 of them and they are-free ride, solo run, and time attack.
Five tracks-Drift land, school, Minami, North, and touge.
Shortcut menu wheel when in the garage.
Dealership-five cars to buy-Mazda RX8, Mazda MX5, Subaru BRZ, BMW E46 M3, and Nissan Silvia S15 all have a handful of colors.
When you buy the car it’s just the shell and a few parts, you need to get the engine and internals.
Paint booth-respray the car with default colors and custom sliders, add decals using a layering system, wheel paint mode, and personalize the number plate.
Strong responsive handling.
Earn cash from events.
Five driving views including a steering wheel and dashboard views.
Quick race-same setup as races before except all cars and parts are unlocked and you cannot do challenges.

Drift21 Preview (Steam Early Access)

Cons:

Long loading times.
The tutorial is just a single race. No explanations or advice just here’s the controls…Go!
A lot of needless button presses and confirmation screens.
No multiplayer.
Only five tracks.
Cannot go full Street racer with your customisation as it does do neons and crazy body modifications.
No leaderboards.
No music in the garage or menu.
No Steam achievements.

Drift21 Preview (Steam Early Access)

Summary

Drift21 is a very good drifting game. As its an early access game it does have very limited content in terms of tracks and events but they make up for that with an abundance of tuning options and car parts to tune and mod your car. The handling model even on just a controller is really good, the tuning and mods aside the game allow you tinker with how the controller itself behaves and this means the handling gets even better. The game boasts realistic car models and their official road name, you can play any mode and challenge on any track whenever you want and earn cash to build more cars. Again the shortcomings being the garage of cars is small (5) and there is no actual single player and instead of a collection of challenges that are very basic. Going forward the signs are good for Drift21 as they have nailed the most important part (the handling) and now the only way is up, I’m hoping for more locations and an actual story or career mode along with more weather types and car customizations. As it is Drift21 is showing encouraging signs of being a competent drifting game and what you have here is good but it comes in limited supply.