The Warhammer 40k series has spread across many different media be it painted figures, board games which go with said figures, books, comic books, and many many different video games. Well, once again, it has come to the video game world, though not in a way it seemingly ever has before.

The people Caged Element Inc decided it was time the Warhammer 40k series makes its way into the Kart Racer genre (kind of). The I first saw the trailer for Warhammer 40k Speed Freeks I thought “its been far too long since we’ve gotten a Twisted Metal game and this could scratch the itch that series left years ago”. So I guess the question is, does it scratch that itch along with delivering the chaos and violence the Warhammer 40k games as a whole are known for? Also, will a publisher switch and pivot away from live service at the last minute hurt the game?

Gameplay

To start, you’ll be given a choice of 6 cars. Some resemble racers and jeeps, and a couple even resemble tanks. You can earn more as you play the game, but this is what you start with. Each will have advantages and disadvantages. As a general rule the smaller ones are generally faster but don’t have the best weapons. The bigger ones tend to be slower, but their guns pack a bigger punch

Warhammer 40k Speed Freeks has two main modes. Deff Rally and Kill Konvoy, each of which have a selection of maps. Depending on the mode you pick will drastically change how you earn points. Each mode you can earn points by just killing the other team, but that’s not how you get the most points. Deff Rally is probably the one people would compare to Mario Kart. You spawn in, wait for a counter, a doorway will open, and you race to the first area. After some time, the first check points will spawn, and you’re racing, or at least that’s the idea. As you hit them, more check points will spawn ’til the race is over. After some time, a new marker will spawn, and you'll do it over. Most of the time, these races are easy to win cause most people are just shooting each other. This mode isn’t terrible, but I’ve started on the 12th many times and finished in the top 3 just by racing with little effort.

Kill Konvoy is where Warhammer 40k Speed Freeks shines, in my opinion. Each team gets what’s called a Stompa, which is basically a giant pyramid shape with tracks and tons of guns. Your job is to protect yours while destroying the other teams. Bombs will spawn, and its your job to go get the bombs and run them to the other teams Stompa to inflict damage. Honestly, this mode is just pure dumb fun. I had a lot of joy shooting at people and racing to the bombs and getting destroyed a lot on the way to the enemy’s Stompa.

There is a 3rd free roam mode, kinda. It’s basically what it sounds like. It exists. Its hard to say if this will become more later, but as it stands, it’s just sort of there. There is Cart and Pit Boss customization options, but none seem to effect game-play, and unless you’re changing the color of something, most aren’t noticeable in game. I can’t help but think that this is a by-product of the publisher switch and live service pivot I brought up in the opener, cause it seems a bit pointless as it sits.

Performance

While running the game at max settings on my 7800xt, I was still able to get pretty rock solid 60fps. When changing the cap to 120fps, it doesn’t quite make it. I can’t say for sure exactly how far up it goes cause any time I try to run MSI afterburner with this game it crashes before I even get to a start screen but according to my AMD adrenaline software it averages about 75 FPS. Sometimes, the game freezes after you try to join a match in progress. It feels like servers act weird almost, but as soon as you load in your good. You will get an occasional hiccup in places which is to be expected in an online game.

Steam Deck

Just so everyone is aware, currently, the Steam Deck rating for this game is “unknown.” as such, this section doesn’t affect my overall score, but I like to include this in case anyone is curious. I was able to get the game going by running it in Proton Experimental with the settings at a mix of medium and low and was able to get between 30-40 fps. This isn’t the most stable experience, and I did have some crashes, one of which just happened in a random match, but mostly when I tried to mess with graphics settings while in the game so I’d suggest doing that in the start up menu. There were a few instances of freezing and hitching, but nothing game breaking, and that could be server issues.

I have hope things may improve. The game incorporates easy anti cheat, which can support Linux at the discretion of the developers, and since I wasn’t banned immediately upon loading up the game on Deck, they have clearly done that. I can’t seem to find any info on whether Steam Deck support is something the devs are actively working towards. I can state that over on the protonDB website it appears many of the issues people have had with the game on Linux desktop did get addressed during beta so official Steam Deck support is definitely a possibility but just be aware I’ve not spoken to anyone involved in the project, that’s just a guess.

Conclusion

I honestly can’t help but think there could have been more to this at launch if there wasn’t a monetization pivot a week before the game was released. About half of what is here is pretty rock solid. I am wondering if maybe Deff Rally couldn’t be reworked to focus just a little on the racing part. Also I think this game could do with a battle mode like Twisted Metal and older Mario Kart games to add some variety to the game. Just a handful of players going at it, racking up points until someone is left standing. No teams, no other goal. I hope they flesh Warhammer 40k Speed Freeks out a bit with some dlc or just added content or something cause as it stands there is some fun to be had but it’s a bit short lived.

This game was reviewed on PC via Steam. I’d like to thank Wired Productions for the review code.