The Crew Motorfest Review: Gameplay Videos, Impressions, Features and Modes

The Crew Motorfest from developer Ubisoft Ivory Tower is an enthralling racing experience not just because of what it accomplishes as a fun open-world racer.

This third series entry following 2018's The Crew 2 somehow manages to provide a serious mix-up to the formula on a smaller playable area, only to closely mimic the summer festival formula found in Forza Horizon.

No franchise does swaps between different classes of vehicles on land, sea and air better than The Crew, but the gameplay and overarching systems really need to stand out in a big way to help the game shake free of the inevitable comparisons.

Gameplay

Good news for Motorfest right at the starting line—it's easily the best-handling game in the series when players are on the pavement.

Cars in Motorfest, spanning a supposed 600-plus vehicles (some are counted multiple times with slight iterations, it seems), feel fantastic. Be it a less-powerful starter ride on loan or one of the most expensive supercars in the game, there's a newfound weight to each ride for the series, which means better grip when trying to do pretty much anything.

The experience is probably a little more arcade than simulation, but this is a game that lets players flip between land, sea and air with the flick of a button and the backdrop characters are a little silly, so that shouldn't be a major shocker. Still, players have a nice suite of assist options at their hands to tweak the experience to their liking.

But there is a tradeoff with the gameplay upgrades. With this release, the variety of different vehicle classes feel notably more different and closer to what players might find in other racing sims. Even a four-wheeler feels wildly different now, with bigger rides much weightier than souped-up sports cars. But the on-water and aerial vehicles and races feel a little drab by comparison. There's some nice realism to say, how waves impact a beachside race or drafts influence a plane, but they're just a little more boring to do by comparison, which at this point, probably can't be helped.

For players who have been with the series from the jump, the open world is dramatically smaller than the past entries, which makes sense—going from a scaled-down continental U.S. to a lone island does that.

But the game might be better for it.

There is simply a wealth of things for players to do here. "Feats" are one of the activities found out in the world while free-driving and triggered by merely driving through them with the proper vehicle. A player's time can then be recorded on specific leaderboards ranking other players.

Speedtraps, escapes, aerial jumps, slaloms that test handling and even passing through narrow gates are some of the other side activities to tackle that can help the hours-counter tick by. Photo ops also return, though pack a little less punch than before because again, the entire United States vs. one island's landmarks.

The game also draws inspiration from other genres via motorfest crates, which drop in at random around the world and provide loot and bonuses, provided players can use their radars to track them down.

The game is somewhat generous in its convenience to players on the exploration front. The entire map is explorable from the start and players can flick through their preferred vehicles with the flick of a button. No blocked-off areas, no hitting a loading screen to go to a garage to select a different ride.

That said, fast travel being locked behind the completion of 10 playlists swings the pendulum back in the other direction and is a bit of a head-scratcher.

Graphics and Presentation

The island of Oʻahu in Hawaii is a gorgeous setting to tear up some asphalt, explore waters or clear skies. It's littered with many different biomes, including dry areas, cities, beaches, mountains, rainforests and even some thrilling hilly volcano treks.

It takes a swerve away from the show-styled event that was The Crew 2 and now goes all-in on the Forza Horizon format with the setting of a car culture festival smack in the middle of summer.

A real star of the show is the lighting. That, plus little details like era-fitting screen filters for themed events featuring old-school cars. A few bonus points go toward the ability to wreck into pretty much anything and get a realistic physics reaction, be it flattening a sign or something else.

This setting is much smaller than previous games, though it's actually to this entry's benefit, simply in just how detailed everything is.

Well, maybe not everything. One of the lacking details players will notice if they frequent the genre is just how light traffic is out on the roads and the complete absence of pedestrians.

Sound design is hit or miss, too. The vehicles sound good, undoubtedly, but voice acting is all over the place just like the soundtrack and the A.I. assistant is a droning voice that sometimes tries too hard to be funny.

A cluttered user interface (UI) is an eye-of-the-beholder thing, but sometimes it becomes tough to navigate the extensive vehicle menus or filter the map to find particular things.

But as a whole, Motorfest catches the vibe it wants quite well in terms of setting. It looks as good as it feels and the sound and feedback of the rides do too.

Motorfest Playlists, Features and More

Some racing game fans might suffer a big hit of deja vu here. An interesting prologue section that asks players to switch between all three classes of vehicles in one big event is fun—but it was done before in Forza Horizon.

That's the sort of vibe Motorfest starts with and never really shakes off. There isn't much of an overarching story, but many of the surrounding characters produce cringe overload, especially the general banter and A.I. chatter while the player drives around the world or partakes in races.

Maybe it's for the better that there isn't a huge story mode, then. Instead, the big gameplay loop here is Motorfest Playlists.

These are different campaigns tailored toward individual car experiences via races, events and challenges. Very much to their credit, they hit some broad, expected strokes, such as an American muscle car scene or night-styled street racing elsewhere, or even drift-only events.

These are all technically available upon initial game launch, but might require the player to have certain types of vehicles. Players otherwise use loaner rides while they work toward unlocking these types of vehicles for their own garages.

In a nice touch for those seeking replayability, the playlist events become replayable after completion.

This playlist system is actually a notable upgrade from the last game, where players simply had to grind out better parts before hitting the right level to challenge an event. Attempting a race while under-leveled felt nearly impossible.

But a disclaimer—the loot-game-inspired parts system returns too. Maybe it's a little unfair to Motorfest and similar games, but grinding for rare gold parts to put on a vehicle just doesn't pack the same punch as grinding for a legendary gun in a first-person shooter.

The spirit of the series remains building a robust collection spanning many a garage, not necessarily an intimate bond with one vehicle. True to that spirit, the game permits players to import their collections from the last title in the series. This includes, for the first time, electric vehicles and Toyota vehicles.

Online play includes races, a demolition derby and a summit contest. The last is a weekly completion in which players tackle nine activities built around a theme with certain modifiers.

A Grand Race is a good-kind-of-chaotic experience boasting 28 players on a course that changes each time.

Most notable is Demolition Royale, with the name saying it all. It's the same idea as battle royales in first-person shooters—players drop into a match as a plane, land, loot for upgrades and work to stay inside an ever-shrinking circle.

It's a brilliant twist utilizing the strengths of the series' all-encompassing nature. Call it a sort of icing on the proverbial cake that is Motorfest's online ecosystem.

As expected, Motorfest mostly nails the online experience and it's fun to just zoom around the world racing strangers and taking part in activities. It's also encouraging to see that the game should keep things fresh with continual updates. But it would have been nice to see an easier way to make friends and/or expand crews with more benefits for working with other players, too.

Conclusion

The Crew Motorfest is a really big leap forward for the series, which makes it unfortunate that it won't be able to escape the Forza Horizon comparisons.

Still, this is a really fun racer with a wealth of content both in the game and planned for the long-term in a format—online or otherwise—that should keep players coming back for more.

Despite surface similarities, Motorfest remains best-in-class when it comes to zany gameplay action that switches between very different vehicles on the fly.

While the size downgrade of the map might prove polarizing, it's hard to not lose track of time in this tropical setting, in large part because of the gameplay upgrade.