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As a kid I wanted to own two arcade games. One was SEGA Rally, which I was finally able to play at home thanks to an at the time impressive Saturn conversion, and the other was GTI Club. I’d only played the game in an arcade once while on holiday somewhere on the south coast, but driving small hatchbacks around tight streets seemed completely different to every other racer out at the time. For some reason though, despite the near constant barrage of arcade racers hitting the PlayStation, a home version of GTI Club never materialised. Thankfully Konami and Sumo Digital have made this young lad very happy.
GTI Club+ is for all intents and purposes an HD remake of the arcade original. You’ve got the same cars, the same small town, the same simple menus giving you access to easy, medium and hard races, and plenty of shortcuts and hairpin corners to powerslide around. This isn’t a new game, but the very same game you played in the arcade (or probably didn’t) spruced up for a new generation of gamers who’d likely baulk at the sight of a simple retro release running on their 1080p PS3.
As such GTI Club+ is something of a niche title. For £9.99 you get what seems to be a pretty small game, a small roster of cars and race events you can breeze through in under an hour and a multiplayer mode for up to eight players. Back in the beginning of the 32-bit era we’d gladly pay £40 for a racing game with three tracks, but these days gamers expect a bit more, even at a budget price. If you thought WipEout HD lacked content (yes, some people are seemingly never happy), you’re not going to get on too well with GTI Club+.
Although there is just the one city the draw here is really time trialling. One of the trophies will keep all but the most hardcore and experienced racers plugging away for many, many hours, although some will simply never manage it. The handling is twitchy but exhilarating and the handbrake is used to great effect. Learning the best racing line will take time and that’s only once you’ve worked out the fastest route. As a single-player experience GTI Club+ rests on your willingness to be taken in by the leaderboards – without any pull towards them you’ll likely wonder what all the fuss is about.
It’s the online multiplayer that’s likely to keep the majority of people coming back though. Speeding around tight city streets in small cars (Minis, Renault 5’s, Volkswagen Golfs and more), barely missing oncoming trains and traffic, and honking your horn at seven other players is tremendous fun – in truth, driving in a mini with a police siren as your horn was never going to be anything but great entertainment. Eight-player races proved to be relatively lag-free, while the Bomb Tag mode (pass the bomb around an open city) provided plenty of laughs.
Sumo has done an excellent job bringing the game into the modern era visually while retaining the same gameplay (and HUD if you dislike the new one), but it’s by no means perfect. For the most part the HD visuals run wonderfully, but get a screen full of cars and the frame rate will take a temporary and rather disappointing nose dive. The game looks good, but it certainly doesn’t look good enough for frame rate issues to crop up as regularly as they do. Screen tearing also rears its ugly head from time to time, which is more of an annoyance than a enjoyment ruining problem.
In the end whether or not you should fork out £9.99 depends on the kind of gamer you are. If you want variety you’ll likely grow tired of GTI Club+’s relatively meagre content, but if you’re someone who can spend days perfecting a single lap and fancy a bit of no nonsense arcade multiplayer gaming, look no further. If the game clicks with you, £9.99 might seem like the bargain of the year.
