As a kid, I grew up with several racing games that I took a deep liking too. More than just Mario Kart, I embraced Wipeout, Gran Turismo, and Burnout. I hold fond memories of getting better and better at these games, they were some of the most fun to master. There’s just something about ascending from figuring out the controls in my first few races, to beating the fastest times in a time-trial. It has been ages since I have devoted time to a racing game.

Quite surprisingly, I was offered the chance to review Drone Champions League – The Game. When I told the editor I was open to anything, I meant it. I love getting out of my comfort zone to try new things, and racing drones was definitely not on my radar until this opportunity came up. I gladly accepted the offer and thought back to the aforementioned racing titles. I knew that this game had potential. even if its Gamescom World Premiere showing was a scant ten seconds, having the unfortunate slot before Death Stranding.

Much to my delight, ten minutes in and I was having a blast. I was pleasantly surprised to see the game perform at a solid 144fps maxed out on my modest rig, while having a vast draw distance and above-average polish in the environments; especially considering the drones move so fast that you can barely see it. The first few tracks are a very short breeze, which is perfect for letting new players get into the swing of things. In addition, there are a lot of cool drone skins in-game, several planned events, and a wild variety of environments to enjoy, from an industrial factory to snowy halfpipes.

There are four flight modes in the game: Arcade that handles easy, GPS that operates slowly and more like a camera drone, and then two more advanced modes, angle and acro(batic). The latter two modes require a lot of time and patience to master, as I was not able to get a grip on it after 45+ minutes of frustration. Balancing the pitch of the drone is enough of a barrier of entry before accounting for breakneck turns. The benefit of these modes is a guaranteed, significantly faster time than arcade runners can ever achieve.

This divergence in difficulty is essential in separating players that will refund the game in the 2-hour window and people who will feel the massive reward of constantly improving to the extent of mastery. Such high skill caps in games are becoming more commonplace after the Dark Souls series revived brutally-challenging gameplay; something not commonly seen since the SNES era of video gaming.

Regarding DCL – The Game as a whole, the experience is fun for me in both the limited arcade mode and the exasperating acro mode. I will absolutely be putting aside some time to get this mode just right. The breakneck pace of the game will be a worthwhile payoff to the dedication needed to flourish. I have a newfound respect for drone flyers, it is evident that the level of talent needed to be adept in this niche hobby is astronomical. I appreciate Climax Studios for putting in the time to make a clever control scheme that matches fantastic settings and courses, and I will be playing much more DCL in the future!

A PC review copy of DCL – The Game was provided by THQNordic for this review

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DCL - The Game

$39.99 USD

8.5

Score

8.5/10

Pros

• Varied environments for tracks
• Surprisingly good music
• Lots of polish
• Exploring in Freeflight is a blast
• Performance is great

Cons

• Drone sounds are accurate, and annoying
• Hard to get good at realistic flight mode
• You automatically go faster on controller than mouse/keyboard