I am on a journey to beat 360 random Xbox 360 games. Here's my next adventure.

Game number 27 was F1 Race Stars. This is a kart racing game with the characters being famous F1 racers… I guess. I don’t actually follow F1 racing so these people may be fake for all I know. It follows many of the ideas present in Mario Kart and honestly could be described as a cheap knockoff of those games.

The big gimmick of this game is that you are forced to play an arcade kart racing game, but there is no ability to drift. Instead, you need to focus more heavily on precise routing and direct driving lines. This may seem like an interesting spin on the genre at first, but it just doesn’t work and you will find yourself wanting the ability to drift throughout the game.

If I only spent a few hours with this game, then I would also say that the courses weren’t made without the ability to drift in mind. This isn’t correct. After playing most of the courses 10-15 times, I realized that there were good routes and precise maneuvering is actually rewarded. I don’t know many games where my opinion of it actually increased with playtime, so it's interesting that this game has this phenomenon.

The tracks vary from agonizingly bad (Monaco and Germany) to pretty decent (Abu Dahbi and Brazil) but doesn’t have any stand out successes. I don’t think any single track is a masterpiece. On the other hand the only two tracks that I hated were Monico and Germany. Monaco has a bunch of hairpin turns that are slow and boring and Germany is otherwise good but has the worst shortcut in any racing game I have ever played. It is almost impossible to get into the shortcut and you NEED to use it to win in some of the more difficult races.

The powerups are all uninspired. Every single one is essentially a retexture of something from Mario Kart. There are bullet bill, red shell, and green shell knockoffs. The only one that is kind of unique is the safety car, which slows down the first place person.

Along the tracks, there are speed boost sections. By pumping the gas a few times, you will get a big speed boost. These are actually pretty interesting and require some thought and expertise to eventually master.

I ended up getting 100% medals in the campaign of this game and had a good time overall. There are a bunch of different game modes that you need to master. For example, there is a mode where you need to go through a bunch of gates and score points to win. There is another where you need to pick up the most items to win. I appreciated the variety and thought that it made the game bearable.

The one game mode that was TERRIBLE was the pure racing. This forces you to do the tracks without powerups and your kart is extra fragile. I spent 3 hours on the pure racing cup in order to beat it. 3 HOURS! I had to absolutely master the racing system and the maps so get in first place. It was one of the hardest racing achievements I have ever done and I hated it the whole time.

I spent a lot of time with this game and initially despised it. After awhile, I eventually came to see some of the good things that F1 Race Stars brings to the table. While I do not think that there is ever a need for anyone to go out and play this game, I don’t think it is as bad as I and probably most reviewers think. There is actual strategy to be had here. That being said… I don’t see any reason why anyone should ever play this game. It is just a worse version of Mario Kart. (4/10)

I spent 13 hours 56 min and 30 seconds on F1 Race Stars

I have spent a total of 285 hours and 38 minutes on the Road to 360 challenge so far.

Next game: Konami Classics Vol 1

Lastly, I played this game on NTSC Xbox 360 and that wasn't one of the options listed. I just chose PAL Xbox instead... but this game does exist on NTSC if you are looking.