The Crew Motorfest review: Flashy rides and empty streets

The Crew Motorfest is Ubisoft and Ivory Tower’s latest installment in the arcade racing genre. The franchise itself has come a long way over the years and has seen players racing as cops, flying planes while performing different stunts, and riding bikes at breakneck speeds, all from the comfort of their homes. At this point, when there are plenty of arcade racing titles available in the market, how does The Crew Motorfest stack up against its competitors?

Well, there are certain areas and features where the game does really well, while there are some areas that could have received some more love. And then there are areas that just did not sit well in the game. With that said, here’s our in-depth review of the game.

You won’t run out of cars in The Crew Motorfest

The Crew Motorfest was advertised as a game about cars, and it has a lot of them. Starting from vintage vehicles to modern-day hypercars, there is just so much that the game has to offer in terms of the choice of vehicles. And if you’re bored with four wheels, you hop onto a bike and take it on a spin.

And if that isn't exciting enough, you have a choice of planes and boats waiting. With The Crew Motorfest, every race is an adrenaline-fueled adventure. Furthermore, you can also import your cars from The Crew 2.

What makes this more interesting is the fact that you have dedicated cars for every playlist in the game. Most importantly, the playlists have an in-depth history as well. For example, if you’re going through the Liberty Walk playlist, you’ll get to know about Wataru Kato and how the car customization scene evolved in Japan.

Kato-san and his Liberty Walk are one of the biggest names in the automotive tuning industry, and to see him featured in the game is nothing short of spectacular. The same holds true for every playlist that the game has to offer.

Cars have some amazing body kit and performance upgrade options. (Image via Ubisoft)

When it comes to the cars, starting from the components under the hood to the body kit, everything is customizable. For visual customizations, you will have to purchase the components from the store. The performance components, on the other hand, are given off as rewards for winning races.

There are two specific approaches that you can take while tuning a vehicle. You can either use parts with the highest rating and rarity, or you can go into the “Pro Settings” menu and balance out individual parameters. Although the latter isn’t a necessity, you can squeeze a few more horses out of the engine if you get the settings right.

That said, you have prompts that also tell you what each parameter does, and the effect that it will have on your vehicle. You can tinker with this as much as you like, and the results are visible too.

As for the liveries and the paint job, there’s no limit to how creative you can get. Given the amount of freedom that The Crew Motorfest offers when it comes to customizing your ride, you can make a design that is unique to you and reflects your driving style.

Exploration feels slightly off in The Crew Motorfest

Visual elements, even at night, are fairly detailed. (Image via Ubisoft)

When you’re driving around the island of Hawaii, you will experience some oddities. For example, more often than not, you will notice ghost cars speeding by you, or even through you at times. It’s hard to tell if these are real players or AI due to the lack of name tags on top of them.

Sometimes you crash into these cars as well. So it’s really hard to distinguish between traffic and fellow racers on the map because even these ghost cars turn transparent only when they come close to you.

The one good thing about exploration is that the minimap is huge. You can see the roads clear, and the GPS navigation does a good job as well. However, it’s the AI assistant that can get annoying. Cara, as this assistant is called, can help you select between playlists and races and can also help you set waypoints with the click of a button.

However, it’s the constant talking that gets unnerving after a point. It feels like there’s a backseat driver who’s constantly going on and on about something or the other.

Cara, your AI assistant will help you plan out routes. (Image via Ubisoft)

To make matters worse, there’s no way to mute this assistant either. Other than that, the map feels very bland. The Crew 2 map felt better and livelier than the one that I saw in The Crew Motorfest.

Every once in a while, you’ll notice pings around the minimap. This indicates that there’s treasure around you. The closer you get to the treasure, the frequency of this ping increases. While it’s worth seeking out these treasures, the process gets boring and tedious after a while.

The Crew Motorfest gets the audio-visual elements correct

The Crew Motorfest was advertised as a game that had flashy cars, a vibrant environment, and a set of music playlists that matched the overall vibe. While the environment feels dull, the developers have done a spectacular job with how the cars look and feel. Not just that, they’ve curated the perfect music playlist that sets the mood of the game.

It will make you feel as if you’re in a car meet where everyone is showing off their ride, and there’s no discrimination based on what you’re driving. From vintage Chevrolet enthusiasts to racers who love going sideways in Toyotas and Mazdas, The Crew Motorfests’ audio-visual elements ensure that everyone is welcome.

The pro tuning mode allows you to adjust every single component under the hood. (Image via Ubisoft)

As for the car physics, they’re predictable, which is a good thing. If you’re running a rear-wheel drive car, and you come across a 90-degree turn, you will either powerslide through the corner, or you’ll drift, depending upon how you approach the turn.

If you’re in a front-wheel drive car, you won’t slip and slide that much. Of course, the tuning affects the overall performance and handling of the car, but even without the tuning, the cars handle well.

In conclusion

Equipping upgrades can be done with the press of a button. (Image via Ubisoft)

The Crew Motorfest is a robust title that’s aimed at the modern-day arcade racer/sim racing fan. While there are a lot of aspects that the game gets right, there are some areas that require some polishing. There’s one issue that I personally faced while trying to get this title to run on my device.

My laptop has a dedicated GPU and an internal GPU. In order to get this title to run on my device, I had to disable the integrated GPU despite setting the dedicated GPU as the primary device from the Nvidia Control Panel.

Secondly, The Crew Motorfest just wouldn’t run on my primary display. I would constantly receive no more than 2-3 FPS. However, the moment I switched to the secondary display, the frames jumped up and stabilized at 30.

Moreover, there are certain aspects of the game that are extremely similar to the Horizon series. For example, the introductory section, which also serves as the tutorial, feels quite similar to what I’ve seen in the Horizon series. Then you also have Cara, the personal assistant, who feels and functions very similarly to that of Anna from Horizon.

They do have their unique elements, yes, but taking a slightly different approach with respect to these segments would have probably helped the game establish an identity of its own.