XF Extreme Formula

Exhilarating gameplay with nuanced piloting mechanics and extremely fun maps. This game's even better than what I was missing from F-Zero.

Very obvious nod to F-zero GX on the gamecube back in the day with some different game mechanics and machines with different specifications based on what you want to do. still, early access and there's a training mode if you want to learn how the machines work.

mom i cant see what the fuck is going on i have major tunnel vision

As an opening note, being that this game is in early access, you are paying for a game that isn't jam-packed with features, as the only gamemodes are Tournament, Single Race, and Time Attack. Not a slight against the game, but please bear that in mind if you decide to buy this game.

Anyways, I've been bouncing around all sorts of anti-grav racers, as it's my favorite racing genre (my favorite being Redout 2). From the ones that I've played (Aero GPX, GRIP, Redout 1/2, and now this), I can say this is my favorite game of the bunch so far, and comes as close as to the sense of speed that F-Zero GX gives. And while it's really good at replicating the speed of that game, it stands out as it's own with it's unique mechanics that make it it's own thing. Put it simply, it's a challenging, frantic, and super fun AG racer with the tight controls of the F-Zero games, while having it's own unique mechanics that offer a different take on the genre.

Note that I'll be mainly touching on XF's racing mechanics in this review, but I will talk about other aspects of the game as well after.

XF's unique mechanics

IMO, it's the best part of XF's unique mechanics, and shows that an "F-Zero-like" can still be just as interesting without replicating it's central mechanic one to one.

Everything else...

Closing thoughts...

Pros:
-Feels like F-Zero.
-Already has a lot of great original maps.
-Split-Screen in this day and era.
-Cool soundtrack.
-Feels like F-Zero.

Cons:
-No Captain Falcon.

Buy this if you want to go fast. Well crafted, works on steamdeck, fast as fuck with fun music and pretty awesome level design.

The game is so simple on the surface, then you see the HUD showing the Air Pressure, Gravity, Temp and you know some huge nerds were behind this game. They got flavor-text for every planet and moon and some of them don't even have tracks on them. They have this sick forced-air-intake boost system that stacks exponentially if you have the confidence to never let go of the boost button.

Don't even get me started on the soundtrack.

Started playing a few days ago, and I can confidentially say I like it. The physics are fun and exciting, and aren't boring. I also love the F-Zero inspiration. The scenery is cool and unique, with many different environments. The self-paced tutorial system is also good, as it allows you to get used to the game at your own pace. Overall it's a solid buy, and I recommend it to those who enjoy classic arcade racing.

What NintenDon´t

After 20 long years, Extreme Formula might just be the game GX fans have been waiting for. It combines performance with the thrilling "look and feel" of a futuristic racer, capturing the essence of what makes this genre so beloved.

Extreme Formula impresses with sharp visuals and an ultra-smooth experience, supporting 8K resolution and unbound framerates. The clear, minimalistic design ensures a fast and fluid presentation, perfectly suited for high-speed action.

The driving mechanics are spot-on, offering precise controls that perfectly suit high-speed racing. The sense of speed is phenomenal, immersing players in an adrenaline-pumping experience. Additionally, the innovative "Oxygen Mechanic" adds a clever layer of strategy and is brilliantly implemented. Some tracks also feature open sections, offering a refreshing twist and new gameplay possibilities.

The variety of tracks and vehicles is already impressive, with highlights like the Earth Cup, which showcases the developers' creativity and leaves players excited for future expansions. Each track is unique, and the settings are caputred nicely.

The soundtrack is a perfect match for the fast-paced action, featuring energetic, memorable tracks that elevate the overall experience and feel like a medley of X / GX and GP-Legends.

Criticisms:

While Extreme Formula excels in many areas, there are still some rough edges:
Collision feedback feels off, with abrupt stops or unnatural "bouncing" off walls and opponents, which disrupts immersion.
The starting sequence sometimes feels awkward, with AI behavior being particularly strange at the beginning of races.
Occasionally, there are minor visual glitches during intro sequences.
Graphical effects could use further polish, though the game's performance remains unaffected.

Final Verdict:

Despite these issues, Extreme Formula is the most exciting entry in this genre in years. While games like Redout and Fast Racing brought their own flair to futuristic racing, this title comes closest to recapturing the magic of "F-Zero" franchise. With just a few refinements his could become a masterpiece.

They put Gran Turismo style license tests in an anti-grav racer. Enough said.

Absolutely amazing. If you like anti gravity racing games, this one is a must own. It already has plenty of content but i'm very excited for the updates to come.

Tutorial mode is actually flexible - it does not lock players at the beginning of the game for tutorial and you can choose to leave mid-tutorial if you don't like it, which I do like. Starting out of a bat can even unlock two machines, one of which is the best machine for time-attack, not great against unfair AIs when it comes to "beyond difficulty." This game is actually pretty generous towards unlocking new machines.

Physics are phenomenal! Any small marginal errors during time-attack will punish hard: personal advice is know the mechanics very well for every machine - there is a reason why the tutorial exist.

Music is well diverse mainly techno and electronics with some rock in it- I enjoy every single OST races, even I stopped playing I just can't get over the soundtrack. It's very well designed to enjoy and keep playing.

I am not very picky about micro frames and crash physics and such, just the overall play-style with a simple game over or didn't get to the top 3. Graphics itself is a nice cherry on top. I do like machines that go fast it did felt like a well-polished F-Zero X/GX version. I played this during the free demo and even bought right at early access.

My only comment would be if the machines are worth unlocking. Most machines unlocking for are better off at lower difficulty. Unlock machines at "beyond difficulty" I expect to be alot faster and better overall than the unlocked machine at tutorial.

How would I rank this game? I would give an overall scale of low 8 out of 10. I would realistically give a 7.5 despite its major flaw, however the high scale graphics, physics and music were so good I will be very generous about it.

This game is still young, I would give a year or two for this game to be (fully) polished.

This game is straight gas!! It's so good!! Yippee!

F-ZERO REBORN

A fantastic F-Zero inspired game, I'm glad that after Ferpard was able to perfect his sonic like games with spark 3, he went on to make great racing games!

An amazing game that does more than be an f-zero clone. This stands on it's own and the gold standard for the futuristic combat racer genre. Fantastic track design, interesting lore, and unique mechanics that serve in favour of the gameplay. None of it feels like tacked on fluff. And 39 tracks is outstanding, most if not all taking place in unique environments that all feel distinct. The soundtrack and graphics are top notch too.
An all around fantastic time and like i said, the gold standard.

it's fun

This is THE spiritual successor to F-Zero GX. There are no games that come this close, with Fast RMX coming in second. It does enough to build on the formula that it's a wonder the big N hasn't already tried! It's obviously still in early access, but what's on display already is so extremely fantastic (or XF, for short!). The core gameplay is entirely present and it feels absurdly good. All of the tracks have their own identity and take place in very memorable settings. There were many times playing throughout all the tracks where I had a great big grin because of how cool something was.

The music is great, the graphics are more than serviceable, and the game is FAST. There is a mode that will help you with the mechanics of the game which also pushes you to get faster and faster times on the tutorial courses. The game isn't overly difficult, but it's no slouch either. Most of the time, your obstacle won't be beating out the other racers, but beating the track itself and trying to shoot for better times. In my experience, the difficulty settings don't matter too much, but it could be that I'm good enough where I don't really notice it? I wouldn't even call myself amazing at the game, but apparently decent enough to outrace the AI and only worry about falling off the course.

Split-screen is currently in the works and technically playable in the beta branch at the time of writing this review. It's great to know that it is being worked on, especially knowing that you can use something like Steam Remote Play or Parsec to play online with your buddies who don't even own the game using this method. Not sure how well input latency would hold up with a game as fast as this but hey, worth a shot. Hopefully we can see online multiplayer soon!

This is the only indie futuristic racer that I've played that feels like F-Zero rather than Wipeout.

This guy gets it

Fantastic game and super fast. Cars control buttery smooth.

Only gripe is that I can't remap overdrive from Y to LB

The game is locked behind a compulsory near-20 stage tutorial of short, inane and boring sections, each with three grades to beat. Not that these are hard, but this forced tutorial wastes your time. If you're not good at these F-Zero likes, you might find those two hours go by fast and refunding becomes a dream.
That said, driving is fine. A lot of the animations are off though, trying to steer with R2/L2 gives you one-frame animation, same with boosting. I get the intention, it just looks cheap and awkward. The lack of smoothness is apparent with when colliding with objects.
I'd wait for the game to come out of early-access and see if the tutorial stages become optional. You can pick up other futuristic space racers and have more or less same fun.

Lake Feperd has done it again, and I continue to find myself loving his work. XF is probably one of my favorite racing games of all time. It manages to perfectly capture the spirit of the sport, while also innovating on the Anti-Gravity (AG) genre of racing. The obvious inspiration from past works such as Fast Racing NEO or F-Zero Gx are a fun aspect to notice, but this game improves upon them in a way that easily makes it the definite AG racer.

From tracks that twist and turn at every corridor. To the vacuum mechanic, that sees you driving in the dead of space, with you having to manage your vehicle's oxygen meter more closely, and the music & sound effects becoming more distorted, creating nice sequences of spectacle, as you hear the engines of you and the other racers roaring in the chaotic tracks. And with over 30+ tracks to choose from and 14 vehicles, each with their own driver, I'd say that XF is shaping up to become a cult classic, among AG racing fans, and the like.

It could not get anymore of my furthest recommendations as fans of the F-Zero series will love this game, and even just fans of the racing genre in general. With a story mode campaign sure to be following the games full release, I can easily say that XF is well worth the $19 dollar price tag.

Great AG game! Has some really phenomenal tracks and songs. Early access, so still waiting on that story mode. But it does have lots of grand prix, races and time trials.

A love letter to F-Zero GX - with more to come. Developer has had 3 games to perfect speed, and they've done it beautifully in this game.

You absolutely HAVE to stop resetting our saves every time you push a new beta branch. Or at the very least, have everything unlocked.

I am not playing through 12 baby mode courses 1 by 1 just to unlock the first cup AGAIN. I've already done it twice, this is the dumbest prerequisite to being able to PLAY the game I paid for.

Lot of potential with this one!

Early access rating 7.5/10.

Awesome trip down memory lane for F-zero gx lovers! There are more games like this that go for a sense of extreme speed without the use of weapons like Redout 1 and 2 and Fast RMX.

Highy recommended and works pretty good on deck as well btw ;)

It's alright, but needs a lot more to stand out. Online multiplayer would do this game wonders, even split screen would be nice. I would like to see more mechanics, like sliding, slamming, items or even something new to spice things up. I love whats here, and i know its in early access, so hopefully things like this will release in future updates.(but come on, this game just screams multiplayer madness.)

This developer really brings in the fun in games really reminds me of great games released in the 2000s before 2010s came along instead rather focus on profit more than fun.

I wish this person the best and hope they can grow bigger with more games in the future.

Very cool, very fast.

If you, like me, are looking for something to fill the void which Extreme G, especially XGRA, left behind, look no further!

Handling, visual fidelity, the boost system and the sheer amount (30) of race tracks, each carefully designed around a certain idea, gimmick or play style... Wow.

The race tracks are looooooong. No twitchy "go around in 30 seconds" nonsense like Wipeout introduced to the genre. Some take minutes for one lap.

Remember games which you needed to learn, so you get good enought to unlock new cups and racers? This is one of them.

I enjoyed GRIP, I liked Redout 1 and 2, I love Super Pilot, and thought Aero GPX was peak f-zero-like. But overall, to me, XF Extreme Formula rightfully took the crown. And all this by a single dev from Brazil. incredible!

What a rush! Amazing game with enough content to play and master to rival full priced racers.
As it stands, the game is split into two main gameplay loops. The first is in NOMAD, where you race to complete small tutorial sections of a gargantuan greyscale map. I love the challenge and the strictness in getting gold. In my attempts I naturally failed to get bronze, then consistently got bronze then silver then finally achieved gold. Unlike normal races, the track was a lot harder to read (please change the transparent turn walls to include a red X or something) but the trial and error is a part of the challenge.
The second and main selling point of the game is in the nearly 40 stunning racetracks. The environments are a beautiful, utopic futurism that inspired me to lay down the controller and take in the sights. Most courses feel unique, taking advantage of the game’s unbelievable number of mechanics. I played with the Intense difficulty, and while I didn’t like the AI’s rubberbanding (especially reverse rubberbanding where they sometimes just slow down at the end of the race), I found it to be functionally a fun level of challenge. Health and attacking never feels important enough to concern with as it stands. The tracks are designed with speed in mind, so I find equal HUD space of the pair of FUEL and HULL to the much more important RAM and O2 to be misleading. Instead of health, something like a way to steal O2 or a more punishing loss of speed when receiving a spin attack would be more effective, I feel. This would also make acceleration a more useful stat.
The last critique I have regards flying. Instead of death planes, I would prefer there to be invisible walls or some visual indicator of forbidden zones. Particularly in Jupiter, I encountered situations where I would fly too high and overshoot the racing area and die. This discouraged me from finding shortcuts. This mechanic has a lot of potential (like a better and freer version of gliding in MK) so I hope some kind of small tweak is made.
My favorite character is NEVER CENTAURI. I love that the lack of turning and general slowness encouraged Over Strafing. It made each race more intense. My favorite track is Mariner’s Tribute. I love water mechanics, and this track is the perfect balance of fast fun and strategic turning.

Oh boy now this felt gooooooooooood ! This feeling of speed is on point. We are early in Early Access though and there is one thing bothering me, where is the news feed? I like to follow games I feel a hitch for. XF Extreme Formula is in the right spot to replace the F-zero game have been waiting since the N64 and GC games but there is obviously still a lot to do, the menu kinda sucks, it is unsexy and why don't we get a chart of our best time instead of a text describing the planets (that nobody cares) in the race tournament selection? There are plenty of little stuff like that that needs to be improve I would not certainly not tell you to absolutely buy it right now if you want to be safe but if only if you reaaaaally want to see a great F-zero inspired game like me in order to support their effort. XF feels a little more demanding in term of skills than F-Zero from what I have seen, especially when it comes to managing the turns it asks for a lot more precision and timing I felt.

Is this the Perfect F-Zero challenger? Maybe, it is one a good path to get there but right now it is too early to say, we need multiplayer and story modes to open out then we shall be able to see where does it stand exactly.

game is fun but has to be really poorly optimized. i have a Radeon RX 7900 XTX and a Ryzen 7 7800X3D and it somehow struggles with the overkill settings even though i play new games at max settings no problem at 4k high framerates. can't recommend this game until they figure that out, although i do admit maybe it's somehow a problem on my end of course, maybe it's using the integrated gpu or something idk comment here or pm me if anyone reading this has had this problem

also the inability to rebind controls is a huge oversight, won't be changing my review until that's added

This game feels really nice to play. I've seen a lot of comparisons to F-Zero GX and I honestly don't think that describes the way this game feels well enough. The vehicles all have really nice designs, with references in the form of the White Kestrel and Crosswinds to Blue Falcon and Little Wyvern respectively. I'm a fan of the more realistic approach in how they perform like literal rockets here, alongside using oxygen to propel themselves in this gameplay loop of trying to maintain a positive feedback loop as long as possible. Easily the worst part of the game right now is how frustratingly often the AI will rubberband like mad. I've had times where I'm way ahead and pumping out boost, and the AI will just blitz past me anyway. Or sometimes I'm near the end of the track, and all the AI racers just... Stop for me? Or they slow down a bunch till I blitz past them and then pretend to fall behind just to speed past me later. It's extremely disingenuous even for rubber banding standards when I finish a track because every single racer stopped RIGHT at the finish line to wait for me. (As in a complete stand still. How the fuck?)

The spin attack needs some work in ways I'm not quite sure of, but it feels weird to use. I like hitting people with it to slow them down and get them off my tail, but often times I'm met with the circumstance of not landing it cause it feels like i can't get close enough to hit someone without killing my own momentum cause of how you have to steer your Hover Jet (I think that's what they're called in this game) like a rocket, meaning you need to be super consistent on turns or else you'll lose all your built up momentum. It feels like it was thrown in just to remind me that this game is F-Zero inspired, but nothing more. It's fun to slow everyone around you to a halt and blitz past them with it, but it feels a little jank otherwise.

The OST is stellar. I don't think there's a lot I can say about it other than it's just really damn good.

The space segments feel alright. You lose boost access in exchange for constantly expelling oxygen for a steady stream of boost power. But this is insanely crippling on any Hover Jet with low O2 reserves or boost power (both of which are tied to the same stat, so have fun Crosswinds users). Not to mention if you strike a wall, you're now at a screeching halt and basically can't catch up to anyone at all anymore. Not very fun.

Overall I'm excited to see where this game goes. But definitely some kinks need to be ironed out right now. But none of it detracts from my enjoyment of the game right now.

XF stands for eXtremely Fun

Great music, each machine feels unique and fun, different surfaces are satisfying to skim over, there's good variety in tracks from speedy to technical. I like the "use boost to get boost" ram air mechanic, you go extremely quick if you use it efficiently and you get left in the dust if you abuse it.

If there's one thing to criticize at the moment, it's the AI. On harder difficulties, they cheat, which is to be expected (in fact, the game straight up tells you in plain text that they cheat). No complaints there. But on lower difficulties they cheat in the same way, rubberbanding and flying past you at unreasonable speeds at the start of a lap, but then they'll hit the brakes and stop dead in the middle of the track just before the finish line so you can pass them for the win. This is very noticeable, and takes a bit of the satisfaction away from a win knowing the AI just handed it to you for free. Definitely needs tweaking.

Overall though, would recommend to any anti-grav racing fan. Long Hauler is the best machine btw.

The closest game to F-Zero GX I've found. Really good, lots of tracks.

An amazing spritual succesor to Nintendo's F-Zero GX!!!!!!!!!

This game is so sick.

Holy shit never thought I could get another F-Zero experience again. You fucking nailed it. Also, the music is amazing.

Had a lot of fun playing this game. Difficulty can be brutal, but that's okay because I wanted the challenge. I haven't fully completed training mode and I say that is the most brutal part of the game, but I still win the real races. I really like the variety of the races in terms how the race changes when in vacuum (space) versus when you in an environment with gravity and whether or not there are obstacles to race past. For Feperd Games's first racing game, I say good job. Looking forward to story mode!

Man
I
Love
Antigravity racing games

Brutal and extremely fun
Looking forward to the full release as there are tons of tracks

game good

ehhhhhh? there's something here, but the main gameplay loop is unsatisfying, the tracks feel a bit too basic most of the time, and it gets boring really quickly. It says something about your racing game when the tutorial mode feels more interesting than some of your late-game racetracks. I'm still holding out hope for the eventual story mode (because this IS still a LakeFepard game), but as it stands now in early access, i'd say wait it out. If you want a good F-zero styled game that's in early access, I suggest Aero GPX instead.