Okay, here’s WHAT THE CAR? If you ever thought video games to be stupid and immature then this one proves you’re a foolish wrong one. It’s by Danish indie team Triband who specialise in uplifting comedy games.
This launched in September 2024 on Steam, but it’s also available on Apple Arcade (2023 launch).
It’s a kind of absurdist silly platformer-racing game that’s madness from the off, contains an inexplicable number of friendly bears, and is great fun for all ages. Hurray? Yes, indeed.
The Joys of Irrelevant Silliness in WHAT THE CAR?
Okay, so in this one you take control of a car with legs. The developer is based in Copenhagen and notes on its press kit:
🚨 **DISCLAIMER:**
This game is for entertainment purposes only and will absolutely not improve your driving skills in any way. If anything it’ll make you worse. No one on the development team even owns a car. What the hell is a clutch?
We like that as we passed our driving test in November 2002. Seemed like a big deal at the time. 22 years later and we’ve not owned a single car ever and the last time we drove one was in… 2009? Maybe. It’s been over a decade, anyway, which is ironic given our love for Formula 1 and Nintendo titles such as Mario Kart 8 Deluxe and F-Zero 99.
Although we guess they’re about as far removed from “normal” road car driving as you can get. Don’t get no blue shells when queuing on the M1, you know?
Anyway, WHAT THE CAR? is more the surrealist Donut County (2018) meets… a slow-paced racing game.
What happens is you’re due for a party with your bear friends. But you’re a car without wheels! Instead, you must run on your car legs and use rockets, boosts, sneezes, and stuff to reach the end of each course.
You get a bronze/silver/gold medal depending on how well you did each stage. Behold!
Triband has spent plenty of time ensuring the level variation is unique as each stage offers something weird and wonderful. That can include a car with:
- Long legs
- Short legs
- Booster rocket
- Umbrella
- Skipping rope
- Giant football
And on and on it goes for hundreds of stages! Very impressive imagination from the bods at Triband.
The Apple Arcade edition got some DLC earlier in 2024 with this epic looking Sandstorm! stage (clear hits to Mad Max in this one).
Whilst this is a game for all ages, we must note the potential of much amusement for kids. If you have any, this is a game you should deffo be getting them as it’ll have them laughing like idiots.
There’s even a level creator bit for players to have a go at their own stages, which everyone else can then play on (thanks to the miracle of the internet era).
All tremendous fun, then, and at less then £10 this thing is the gift that keeps on giving.
WHAT THE CAR? is highly recommended if you want several hours of revelling in the silly joys of total and utter irrelevance.
