Smurfs Kart feels soulless enough to give you the red flags right after the start line.
Racing games are my forte, there is something addicting that makes me keep coming back to them, as every single racing game feels different from another. Arcade, sim racer, vehicular combat, running games, and the other little niche subgenres of racing games are important enough to keep the core of the genre mainstream. Now there is another subgenre in the racing category that is played more than any other due to its casual playerbase and widely-known, basic gameplay and that is the kart racers.
Starting from the beginning the first kart racing that popularized today’s kart racing was obviously Mario Kart for Super Nintendo Entertainment System back in 1992. Since then, there have been a lot of spinoffs that majorly employed the same tactic as Mario Kart, however, some franchises were actually able to capitalize on it better than Mario Kart. Crash comes to my mind directly, as Crash Team Racing was quite unique and it was able to become popular enough to continue the series with a few other titles as well.
Now, the core gameplay of kart racers is trying to race against certain opponents, meanwhile, there are also powerups, shortcuts, and hazardous environments laid on top of the wacky tracks that you drive on. Each driver is one of the popular characters from the franchise and it mainly comes down to the preference when it comes to choosing one since all of them have the same attributes.
I am pretty sure most of the people are fairly aware of the kart genre of racing games and sad to say, Smurfs Kart brought absolutely nothing new to the table in terms of innovation and gameplay. Just letting you know that Smurfs Kart on the PC is the port version of console versions, the game was released back at the end of 2022. Before diving into why you shouldn’t go for Smurfs Kart yet, let me explain that there was another Smurfs-themed kart game called “Smurf Racer”, released back in 2001 for the original PlayStation. I feel terrible to say this, but Smurf Racer was more refreshed and unique than Smurfs Kart despite being a very late release on the original PlayStation’s lifetime.
There is no comparison in this review, rather showing what Smurfs Kart can, or mostly cannot, deliver. Before starting, I was thinking of maybe taking the last entry on the Mario Kart series to compare, but it is just better to focus on the main game of this review. Smurfs Kart starts with no intro, nothing gets explained, and the player gets into the main menu with few options to choose from. Single-player or multiplayer, checking options, checking the stickers and that is it really. I will not dive into the multiplayer section yet as it also disappointed me in some regard.
After choosing multiplayer, there are two main option that counts towards the completion of Smurfs Kart—a time trial against other Smurfs or going through a championship. The main course is the championship mode, of course, and there are not so many tracks to choose from.
Three main championships, varying in difficulty, are served to you and in those championships, there are four races. In total, Smurfs Kart only has 12 tracks. The developers used a trick to make the game seem to have more tracks by adding a mirrored mode after completing a championship. This makes 24 tracks in total, a bit cheeky to do but still, it is better to have 24 tracks than 12.
There are two “speeds” to choose from before hopping into a race, one of them is called “Fun” speed and the other one is “Hyperspeed” speed- creative naming by the way. Obviously, the fun speed is geared towards casual players who take a slower approach. The races are slower and more forgiving. Hyperspeed speed, on the other hand, is for enthusiasts who already have some experience with kart games. Although speed is the main word for these difficulties, AI also gets tougher to deal with.
AI in Smurfs Kart has no middle ground, they are either lacking or too advanced for players to keep up sometimes. Since the easy AI is nothing of a threat, it is better to talk about the advanced AI instead. Many racing games feature a mechanic called “rubberbanding”. This effect is usually employed when the player is either too in front of the pack or cannot reach the pack of AI cars in front of them.
Depending on the situation, AI will either slow down and let you catch up to them or have a huge boost and suddenly appear behind you. Using the rubberband technique in a game is not something bad, however, once it is very blatant, then it becomes an issue. Smurfs Kart had rubberbanding that was absurdly in your face that it honestly felt like AI was deliberately cheating in harder difficulties, taking sharp turns, always getting lucky with item boxes, etc.
Talking about item boxes, let’s touch upon the supposed “fun” and “interactive” part of Smurfs Kart. As it is a kart game, it has to feature items to help you with your race. These range from boosts, stray projectiles, death traps, homing missiles that are actually living bees, and so forth. Taking a look at all the items included, none of them are actually new in terms of 30 years of kart racing games. Every single pick-up that you think is unique has been picked up from another game in the kart gaming genre, except for the special attack that every character has.
While picking up your character in the select menu, there is an icon that easily could be missed. It shows what sort of special power the character has and that only consists of the icon, no explanation is given to you about the special power and what it actually does. Only when you get to put against that weapon or when you use it during a race.
Do you learn what it does, which again, is against the code of teaching how kart racing works overall. There is not a manual of the game either so you are not allowed to turn the pages of a real book to learn which character does what and what there needs to be done for 100% completion.
I wish the downsides of Smurfs Kart would end but honestly, it keeps going. At first, I thought the graphics were okay, it’s up to today’s standards and such but once you get used to the graphics, you can start picking up on oddities and low-effort graphics. For example, when you win a podium in any championship, you are rewarded with a scene of you standing on a podium, but the Smurfs around the podium are jumping with static, not giving any impression of being actually alive. Same with the Smurfs in the track as well. They do not move or showcase any sign of life, which leaves a soulless game.
One of the most disappointing parts of Smurfs Kart is the lack of controller support. This is somewhat of an odd choice as racing games are better with controllers. The addition of analog support makes it a smoother experience as steering the kart is always involved. For some reason, the developers did not include support, or most of the community thought so. There is a fix for detecting the controllers but it requires some fiddling with files and finding which line of code needs to be changed, which further proves Smurfs Kart is not a great option if you are looking for a fun kart game.
Did I mention this game has no multiplayer other than split screen? Absolutely terrible idea for a kart racer to not include an online multiplayer in this day and age. If it was the N64/PS era then it could be okay. The internet was not implemented well enough to be considered as another option when it comes to multiplayer, but all you get is a louse, split-screen multiplayer, and even then it is just available for free races.
There are not any battle modes or coop championship progress. It is just very dull in terms of being a party game. Ironically, kart games are supposed to be a casual party game for everyone, and this game can only support up to 2-person mode which is terrible if you have two other people waiting to play as well.
Tracks are maybe the only decent thing about Smurfs Kart. The theme of them and hazards, as well as your weapons, are themed around the cult of Smurfs, and it’s nice that the developers were able to give attention to detail when it comes to creating characters, themes, and tracks. Although short and sweet, the track designs are still lacking as they can get a bit repetitive since there is a very small roster of tracks available to players.
Now someone might argue this game is aimed at children or the people who really love the Smurfs. You’d be right, however, with very little content and an absurd price tag, this game feels not worthy of any parent, or any kids’, time. There is a huge lack of content, barely any replay value, no new game plus for people who did everything, no multiplayer, no even progression system, and a bunch of other absent mechanics that could have made this game better and stand out in the crowd. The price, which is currently priced at $30, is too much for a simple game with the Smurfs license slapped onto it.
Smurfs Kart was looking very promising until the gameplay and overall design of the game turned out to be a simple kart race with the Smurfs theme added onto it. Most of the effort was put into creating models and themes, but the rest feels like it was just taken from the basement of the developer’s studio and added little modifiers into it.
Honestly, it made me sad that Eden Games, the people behind the legendary V-Rally franchise is currently in this situation. I just cannot recommend Smurfs Kart to anyone, well, unless you are into torturing your friends by sending them joke games. Even then this game is too expensive as a joke, so it is just better to stay away from Smurfs Kart as a whole.
