Rishabh Borde
Authentic racing games have been a staple in gaming for decades now, with games like the ‘Gran Turismo’ series on PlayStation and ‘Forza Motorsport’ on Xbox carving out limited, but dedicated niches of fans who enjoy driving virtual versions of their favorite real world cars in a competitive setting. However, the Nintendo Switch had always lacked such a title to satisfy its racing fans, opting instead for cartoonish arcade racers such as ‘Mario Kart 8’. This is why the release of ‘Gear.Club Unlimited’ on the Nintendo Switch and its subsequent sequel ‘Gear.Club Unlimited 3’ was a welcome addition for many.
With two releases in quick succession on Nintendo’s platform, how long is it before we see a ‘Gear.Club Unlimited 3’? Read on to find out everything we know.
What Can We Expect From Gear.Club Unlimited 3?
The first ‘Gear.Club Unlimited’ game initially debuted on the Nintendo Switch in November 2017, and was an expanded port of the popular iOS and Android game ‘Gear.Club’. It is a simple racing video game with a small pool of 32 cars to choose from four class types – A, B, C and D.
You start out with a relatively basic Nissan 370Z or a Chevrolet Camaro 1LS at the lowest championships and work your way up the ladder by racing and earning stars. Stars are earned by participating in any of the game’s three race types – the straightforward Race, Rally Racing and a Time Attack mode where you have to navigate a track within a set time limit. Additionally, ‘Gear.Club Unlimited’ also features a Rewind mechanic that allows the player to turn back time a few seconds to replay sections of the race you may have messed up.
A sequel titled ‘Gear.Club Unlimited 2’ released exclusively for the Nintendo Switch at the back-end of last year and made significant improvements over its predecessor. The car roster is significantly expanded, with a selection of 50 cars from famous manufacturers such as Porsche, Lotus, McLaren, Koenigsegg and Bugatti this time around. The selection of race tracks and locales has also been enhanced, with four unique terrains including desert, coast, mountainside, and nature, each with its own distinct weather as well.
‘Gear.Club Unlimited 2’ also features a more robust selection of game modes, including a single player campaign where you “save the family team from bankruptcy by taking on charismatic riders of all nationalities”, Local split screen Coop and an online Multiplayer mode. The split screen mode even allows up to 4 players playing together as well as Switch tabletop gaming compatibility and support for Switch motion controls. The driving mechanics themselves are somewhere in between arcade and simulation, with adjustable options for three difficulty presets and braking, anti-skid and steering assistance. Another addition to the franchise is the all new customization options for your car with custom parts, paint jobs, stickers, decals, tires and even the brakes.
Despite all its improvements, ‘Gear.Club Unlimited 2’ is also bogged down by several issues that can be annoying, something that ‘Gear.Club Unlimited 3’ will surely be keen to address. The game suffers from performance issues leading to frame drops and jittering, as well as a noticeable amount of input lag that affects driving precision.
Another issue is the User Interface and menu design of the game, which is eerily reminiscent of mobile games where the primary method of interfacing is touching and swiping. Fixing these two issues alone would make ‘Gear.Club Unlimited 3’ a much superior experience. While ‘Gear.Club Unlimited 2’ features a moderately large playing area, the sequel to quite possibly make the transition to a full Open World, much like ‘Burnout Paradise’ did a decade ago.
Other possible enhancements include a more substantial story mode in lieu of the barebones one we currently have, a larger roster of cars, better visual fidelity and new game modes such as more robust competitive online Multiplayer mode.
Gear.Club Unlimited 3 Developers: Who Could Be The People Behind The Game?
‘Gear.Club Unlimited 3’ will likely be developed by Lyon based French video game developer Eden Studios and published by Microids. Eden Studios is best known for games such as open world racing game Test Drive Unlimited 2’ and survival horror game ‘Alone in the Dark’.
Gear.Club Unlimited 3 Release Date: When And Where Can I Play It?
Although ‘Gear.Club Unlimited 3’ has not been announced yet, there’s a good chance that we will see a sequel. However, ‘Gear.Club Unlimited 2’ came out barely a year ago and the earliest I would expect ‘Gear.Club Unlimited 3’ to release is 2021.
‘Gear.Club Unlimited 3’ will most likely be a Nintendo Switch exclusive at launch.
Gear.Club Unlimited 3 Trailer
While we wait for more news about ‘Gear.Club Unlimited 3’, you can watch the trailer for ‘Gear.Club Unlimited 2’ right here:
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