Thank you 3goo for sending us this game to review!

I’ve been playing racing games for quite a long time now. The first racing game that I really enjoyed was probably Pole Position, a Namco/Atari classic from the 1980s. It set the standard for what racing games were like, and it helped that it was a lot of fun, too. Over the years there have been many that borrowed and improved on that legacy. However, somewhere along the way, racing games became a lot more complicated. 4PGP aims to be a return to simpler times, while not giving up many of the conveniences we’ve come to expect.

The developers state that their intended desire was to make an Arcade-style racer that harkens back to the 1990s in style and execution, and I must say, they really nailed it. Starting with the simple title (4-Player Grand Prix?) and bright and colorful art style, it looks, plays, and feels just right. A hardcore simulator this is not – you can largely hold down that accelerator most of the time with only letting off for the tightest turns, just like in the old days. All of those bad habits that classic racing games encouraged that wreck my lap times on modern simulators are back!

4PGP uses a relatively simple but common 3D graphical style, where you see the car from above and behind. You can change the camera view to see the car farther or closer, or view the track from the front bumper. Inside the car is not an option here, which some Arcade-style racers also omit. (Simulation racers usually offer a driver's seat view.) You race on a fully-rendered track, and you can see the other racers you are competing against.

There are three main game modes. They are Championship, Quick Race, and Time Attack. Championship is the main game mode, where you compete across three races and try to win by gaining the most points. This mode is also where you unlock more cars; this is pretty much required if you want any hope of winning races at higher difficulty levels. Both Championship and Quick Race support between one and four players; only Time Attack is one player only.

Racing with multiple players is a ton of fun. While my wife isn't all that good at racing games, a good friend of mine who lives across town joined me in a Steam Remote Play Together session, and we had a lot of fun. Both of us have 21:9 ultrawide monitors, and the game's split screen is vertically down the middle for two players, so we both had plenty of room on the wider screen. We were actually able to unlock one of the cars, too. For three- and four-player games, it splits the screen into quadrants, not unlike other popular racers like Mario Kart.

In Championship and Quick Race modes, there is the option to select one of four difficulty levels: Rookie, Novice, Veteran, and Expert. The first time you play, you can see that while you do have a good starting selection of cars, most of the best ones are all locked. You can't unlock anything by playing on Rookie difficulty level, but on Championship mode, if you can place first in Novice, Veteran, or Expert difficulties, you can unlock new things.

Unlocking new stuff is more than recommended, it's really required if you want to see all that 4PGP has to offer. There are four Championship courses. They are called the 'Top Speed Cup', the 'Slipstream Cup', the 'G-Force Cup', and the 'Aero Load Cup'. While it may seem like you would want to play them in order, and I suspect most new players do, it turns out that the 'Top Speed Cup' is actually one of the most difficult on higher levels. I was able to complete the Slipstream and G-Force cups long before I completed the other two.

The cars you unlock get progressively better stats as you complete cups at higher difficulties. You almost certainly want to complete all four of the Novice cups before moving on to Veteran. You will most definitely need the faster and better-handling cars from Novice to have a chance. Veteran difficulty level is a rather large step up in challenge, as all cars have a higher top speed, and the cars you race against are much smarter. It took me quite a long time and a lot of tries to get past Veteran cups, though I did find it easier to conquer the Slipstream cup first, then G-Force, before tackling the two most difficult cups, Aero Load and Top Speed. I needed each new faster unlocked car to have a chance.

Each car has three stats: Acceleration, Top Speed, and Handling. The ones you can choose from have some combination of those stats, and as you unlock more, they get better and better. One car that you can start with, which has a maxed-out Top Speed but is terrible in other aspects, turned out to be a car I needed in order to unlock some of the better ones, but once I had those I didn't touch it again. Some of the gimmick cars, like the Safety Car, are neat to look at but don't actually perform very well on the track. Whatever the case, you start with nine cars, and can unlock eleven more.

On top of the many cars you have to unlock, there are two new courses, USA and Middle East, and fourteen mirror courses. There are twelve courses unlocked out of the gate - the twelve included in the default Championship cups. They are from around the world, and are all quite different. In Quick Race, if you place first in any single level on Veteran or Expert difficulty, you then unlock the mirrored version of that level to play if you like. It's a neat system that rewards skill and persistence.

I tried pretty hard, but I ended up hitting a bit of a skill wall when trying to beat the Expert difficulty cups. While at first glance it seems like it should be similar to Veteran, the opponents are just that much more challenging, and you have to win five laps instead of three like on all other difficulties. Even still, races are relatively short in length, and can be completed in just a few minutes. The game's fast pace and great sense of speed keeps things entertaining and it never gets boring, even if you lose.

I probably should have mentioned this earlier, but Quick Race is exactly what it sounds like - a single race on any chosen level and difficulty. Time Attack is a rather simple mode, and it pretty much what it sounds like - you drive three laps, trying to get the best lap time you possibly can. From what I can tell, it only seems to track your best times locally, not in any online leaderboard.

Like most racing games, the most important way to win is to optimize the fundamentals - go as fast as you can while maintaining a clean driving line. There are no penalties for going off road, though your car will likely slow down, so do so sparingly and only when necessary. Being an Arcade-style racer, the controls are quite simple: one button to accelerate, another to break, another to change the camera controls, and finally one for turbo boost.

Managing your Turbo is a very important aspect of racing in 4PGP, and pretty much required to win. Boosting helps you accelerate faster, boost out of poor terrain, and even go faster than your car's maximum top speed. You're given a meter to note how much boost you have left, and when you run out, so does your Turbo. Pulsing it quickly or strategically can often lead to better results than going full boost down a straightaway. I personally find boosting through tight corners one of the best ways to gain position.

Each course has one pit stop, usually at the end (or beginning) of each lap. When you drive into the pit, you have one chance to press the A button at the right moment when a little minigame pops up where you have to time the stopwatch. If you get it in the green, you fully refill your Turbo boost. If you don't, you might get a small refill, but not much. It's worth noting that sitting in the pit stop lane does slow you down quite a bit, so it might not be worth doing on the final lap.

There are also other but less important things to manage during a race as well. Tire quality level is one, but pit stops repair that, too. You can also ride behind another car and get a small boost; I think it's called drafting (or slipstreaming), and it can help you pass other cars if you do it well. It doesn't seem to make you a lot faster, but every mile per hour helps.

4PGP ran really well on almost everything I tried it on, as graphically it uses a simple art style that looks nice but doesn't require a lot to perform well. I did notice that there is a visible LoD (level of detail) or texture filtering line that you can see on the menu screen intro, and it's in game as well, though much harder to notice. Graphical artifacts like these are things my trained eye has learned to watch out for; many who just play the game won't notice it. Whatever the case, the frame rate is really stable, and it plays perfectly on Steam Deck. I can even play it on my higher-end Android phone via GameNative (it has a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3) and I get between 40 and 60 frames per second - at my custom ultrawide resolution of 1560x720! If you use a lower resolution, the frame rate could be even better. I feel like a native mobile version of this game could do quite well.

The sound effects and music are well suited to the purpose, and the music is quite peppy and fitting to a racing title. During a race, there are moments without music, and I would prefer it if there weren't, but otherwise no complaints.

This game is ideally meant to be played with a controller. Keyboard play is supported, and I guess racing wheels are possible also, though there really isn't much benefit and I didn't test that. The controls are tight and snappy, and everything works as you would expect in single-player mode. If you play with more than one controller, what surprised me is that the default controller remapping settings I did for player one do not also impact the other players. So, for players 2-4, they will need to know what the default control scheme is. I hope they improve this in a future patch.

I should probably also mention that there is rumble support, and I appreciate it a lot in this game. It shakes whenever you go offroad, giving you good feedback highlighting your mistakes. There is also an Assist mode, where the game will help you lean into turns. It's a bit wonky, because even when going straight, your car will start to move in your lane. Also, when going into the pit, Assist mode can sometimes try to pull you out, even if you haven't gotten your additional boost yet. It's a bit strange. I will say that for some of the most difficult races, for some reason I was able to win with Assist on where I couldn't win without it. I can't put my finger on exactly what it did, but I performed just a little bit better with it on.

This is perhaps one of the cleanest games I've ever reviewed morally. I would let any player of any age play this game. It's fun for all ages.

4PGP is a simple throwback to racing games of yesteryear, and nails perfectly what made those games so fun to play. Despite simple mechanics and simple graphics, it's not easy - it makes you work for those victories. Other than the AI having better cars than you probably do, it overall seems like it's generally possible to win... probably. I have a hard time placing past the middle of the pack on Expert mode. I suppose one thing to note is that once you unlock the best car, there is little reason to use anything else unless a player is intentionally giving themselves a handicap. Whatever the case, 4PGP is a simple, fun racing game that is priced just right. While I doubt it's the best racing game ever or anything, it's fun, and absolutely accomplishes what it set out to do. For that reason, if a simple Arcade-style racer is something you're looking for, I think you'll really like 4PGP.