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By Keith B (23rd Mar 2007)

Out of the relatively large number of racing games that I've seen on the Wii so far (Monster 4x4: World Circuit, Need for Speed Carbon, and GT Pro Series), there was not a single one that really did it for me. The emphasis here must be on ‘so far,' because since the release of Excite Truck, those sad days are over... Excite Truck is an arcade-style off-road racer that does not, at first, look very unconventional in any way. You pick your truck, choose the color, and then head out to race 5 opponents. But after the first couple hundred of meters (which will take you a whopping half second, I'd estimate), it becomes clear that Excite Truck is a racing simulation unlike any other.

Here, when we say speed we mean S-P-E-E-D, as in ‘the speed of light.' And along the same lines, this game is F-U-N, not just simple good old fun. While winning the races remains the central goal, regular racing concepts such as pole position, tire changes, or motor tuning fall flat under the table. Who needs it? All we want is to engage in the longest and highest jumps, the coolest drifts, the craziest pirouettes, and the nastiest ramming maneuvers. Winning, then, takes more than just making first place. In Excite Truck, a simple yet effective system of stars/point that can be picked up and won during each race determine who's the true master of the piste. Accordingly, stars are awarded for air-borne stunts, perfect landings, and so forth.

At the core of all this are the hugest ramps we've ever seen. It's obvious, non? Bigger ramps make for higher and longer jumps, more speed, and more sophisticated tricks. The two kinds of special power-ups that can be picked up along the way are linked to this as well. They have the effect of either giving you yet another speed-boost, or of terra-forming the course (in real-time, which makes for fabulous visual effects) and thus creating new ramps, shortcuts, etc. The point of all that is, you guessed it right, even more speed and even higher jumps! So far, all this should give us two clear clues regarding the design approach of the Excite Truck producers: 1) They disregard racing realism entirely. 2) They made this game all about entertainment and fun.

Part of making this possible is to rely on a very simple controlling system. All that's needed to play Excite Truck is the Wiimote. It is held in a horizontal position, and lateral movements simulate the turning of the steering wheel. Pressing the no. 1 and no. 2 buttons allows you to speed up or to slow down your vehicle, and pressing the D-pad triggers the extra speed boost. While in the air (which seems to be where you are during at least 60% of the time), various Wiimote gestures initiate a few different tricks, help you ride gusts of wind for even higher scores, and furthermore allow you to balance out the vehicle for a perfect landing (for which more stars will be awarded). All this sounds easy enough, and it would be, were it not for the insane speed of the truck that you are trying to steer. The Wii registers the Wiimote gestures very well, and responds excellently to all the control commands. Just don't get too excited behind the wheel, because all-too strong yanks on the Wiimote sometimes don't register so well, which can result in nasty crashes. However, while the controls sometimes don't feel quite as precise as we'd like them to, these are minor complaints that will disappear once you've achieved the right steering mastery.

The speed boosts can overheat the trucks' motors, and should thus be used strategically whenever ramps or water are around, as these will help cool the motor's temperature. Talking of strategy: It's always a good idea to time your use of the terra-forming power-ups. After all, the sudden appearance of a huge mountain or of a flood of liquid lava right underneath an opponent's truck definitely raises the fun-level by yet another few extra notches.

To write about this game's ‘depth' is a difficult thing. On the one hand, there are relatively few courses (19 plus bonus courses). On the other hand, these few courses are so incredibly fun to drive that you will come back to them over and over again. Remember the first times you've played Grand Theft Auto? How many hours did you spend simply driving around, running things over, or delivering pizza? Exactly... it kept on being fun forever. Excite Truck has the same appeal. Where this game excels is in delivering the pure, aimless, ludic delight of experimentation and exploration. Apart from the 4 tournament modes (progressively unlockable like everything else in this game), there are three challenge modes available: A kind of slalom course, a challenge where the aim is to jump through rings over huge ramps, and a kind of death-match course, where 5 opponents must be rammed into oblivion. All of these special modes are good fun, but they don't have the potential to keep you occupied for very long. As mentioned before, the real joy of Excite Truck is in honing your skills to master the regular tracks.

The design of the individual race tracks is nothing short of phenomenal. While the game doesn't offer very many hours of new gameplay, repetitions will not bore you for a long time to come. The real fun basically starts once you've unlocked all tracks and vehicles and advance into the guts of jumpin' truck trickery. In this sense, it becomes obvious that ‘depth' in the conventional sense just isn't everything. On the quite limited number of courses in Excite Truck, you'll nevertheless find incredible amounts of space for an endless variety of stunts wherever you look. The individual tracks can be driven in many different ways... try to master all the ramps, try to evade all the ramps, try to turbo the whole track, or try to get all the stars... there's no end to the different ways of having fun and an extremely varied game experience with this.

Like so many other recent Wii releases, Excite Truck has very little to offer in terms of a satisfying multiplayer mode. Online playing is not an option (by now we've stopped even expecting that kind of thing), and the full extent of playing with your friends is to invite just one single person to race you on a split screen. We sadly remember the many pre-release PR photos of hordes of exhilarated people crowding around single Wii consoles... What the heck where those people playing, all at the same time?

Let's just say, however, that the graphics make up for this. For a change, here's a Wii release that departs from the mediocre Gamecube look and goes a lot further. The different tournaments carry you to a large array of exotic locations, and each course feels very unique and well-designed. The visualization of grow/shrink effects of certain power-ups are spectacular, the textures of surface and water are fine, and you can see just about all the way to the end of the world in this game. It's a different story with the soundtrack and sound effects. Both will begin to get on your nerves before too long, as they are quite repetitive. Fortunately, the developers included a very nifty feature that allows you to bypass the annoying soundtrack: Excite Truck will play your favorite music if you feed it into the Wii's SD-slot. And not only that... the game will actually learn which songs you like particularly well. So if you keep on playing the classic "Keep on Truckin'" over and over again, the game Excite Truck will, after a while, begin to repeatedly pick that song for you. Nice!

All around, Excite Truck is one of the most entertaining games currently available for the Wii. And it definitely is one of the fastest-paced racing games all around (only Burnout may come close). The excellent (if unrealistic) physics of the vehicles, the smooth and simple controlling scheme, and the breathtaking visual effects work together to make Excite Truck an absolute winner. And the incredible speed of it all, well, you have to see it to believe it.