Joy Ride Turbo

Whatever your experience with the series, if you've ever been fond of alternative racing games and have friends wanting to go for a spin with you then Joy Ride Turbo is a no-brainer. It's a legitimate alternative, perhaps an outright replacement, for the likes of Mario Kart.

Joy Ride Turbo isn't perfect, but does wind up delivering a more satisfying racing experience than its predecessor. It controls far better with an actual controller than without it and is delivers a lot of fun. The only qualms I have with it are the sterile world, busy work caused by searching for car parts, and forgettable music.

A real hoot. [Aug 2012, p.77]

Finally a fun racer with a great local multiplayer mode. Despite some sound issues and a flawed online experience, Joy Ride Turbo profits from the Kinect cut and delivers a fine racing game.

The change from motion gesturing to classic pad controls helps Joy Ride: More control, more fun. The matchmaking needs improvement, though.

A cartoonish, arcadey racing game, JoyRide Turbo has solid controls, a good sense of speed, and some interesting tracks and power-ups. Granted, it's too simplistic and easy to keep serious race fans engaged for long (unless their kids don't have to go to bed just yet), but it'll entertain anyone looking for a fun-but-stress-free Sunday drive.

Losing Kinect doesn't lost the joy of this ride. [Aug 2012, p.107]

This mindless racer was enjoyable, fast-paced, and offered up exactly what I was looking for, and that is some cheap racing fun.

Though Joy Ride doesn't exactly have the kind of "hook" to make it as fundamentally important as, say, Mario Kart, it's a steal for ten bucks, and a much better game than its Kinect counterpart.

This time around, it feels like an actual game and not just an extended tech demo. If you can shift down your expectations somewhat (and give up your dreams of breaking any land-speed records), Joy Ride Turbo delivers a solid arcade-racing experience.

It's not quite as good as we thought. [Issue#87, p.87]

Joy Ride Turbo gets rid of motion controls and adopts the digital format, allowing it to become much more accessible and fun immediately. Due to its limitations, it's more recommended to children and casual gamers.

No doubt about it, it's better without Kinect.

Joy Ride Turbo is a good karting game that eliminates Kinect from the ecuation, thus improving control. However, it is still too simple and lacks content, and doesn't bring anything really new to the genre. Despite this, it can bring quite a lot of fun.

A surprisingly decent kart racer that could have been the Mario Kart of the Xbox with a few more tracks and a little more depth. At least this game was made for the proper controller, so no more sitting waving your arms.

Is it that surprising that Joy Ride Turbo seems a little confused? Not really, I guess.

Joy Ride Turbo is exactly what its title promises: a fast, fun experience that unfortunately runs out of value far too quickly. Even at $10, it's hard to recommend, as you could buy Sonic & Sega's All-Stars Racing from a bargain bin for just a few bucks more.

Joy Ride Turbo is a game that can be fun for a few hours, but the music is a bit boring and we can say the same thing about the variety of cars. The cars feel very slow and the circuits look too much alike, so unfortunately this game is only suitable for little kids.