The deal with Drag x Drive & Online Multiplayer games

Published on 16 Aug 2025

Drag x Drive is actually… good. It’s not the best game you’ll hear from Nintendo for sure, and if you’re not into motion control games, definitely shouldn’t go for it.

One of the common criticisms is how sterile the game is in its art direction, and that, yeah, I wholefully agree on it. It does not look very good or appealing in the slightest, and I can’t really defend the game that much because of that, but, as usual, the gameplay is actually pretty deep, though, some of it definitely feel imprecise, like doing Bunny Hops just seem really hard to do reliably to me, but overall the controls are pretty intuitive as long as you kinda know the physics of how something with wheels would work.

I really just am having fun with it, but I dunno if it’s appealing to watch compared to say, Rocket League (and even then, I don’t think Rocket League is that appealing either in its style but that might just be me), as in watching gameplay, looking at how players play, but when you have played the game and mastered it enough to understand, it definitely makes gameplay videos between advanced players look all the more impressive.

But I also need to, like, talk about the elephant in the room. What’s the deal with people acting like they know how to sell a game to consumers better?

No, seriously, a lot of the arguments that I hear about aren’t necessarily about the game, but how to sell the game, and it happens too much for my liking, and I am at a point where I just believe these things are just more complicated than anything.
Heck, a lot of people just also come predisposed with the idea of how multiplayer games should handle things like Fortnite or Rocket League? The idea that multiplayer must be managed to the perfection that it should become extremely addicting, consuming all your time or else it’s a terrible online multiplayer game (oh yeah just to say but lag hasn’t really been much of an issue to me when I played it). Somehow perpetuating that Nintendo should always max out the amount of money (a reminder that gamers still love capitalism, and yes Nintendo loves it too I know that I’m not stupid).

I don’t believe Nintendo has ever intended for Drag x Drive to be THE multiplayer game. I don’t think they’re that gullible, and most likely knew it’s absolutely not going to take by storm (just see how the promotion went, there was barely anything), and they just did their idea with less than 20 developers at Nintendo, and somehow they produce a $20 game, that currently (2025-08-16) is #2 in the rankings for the European Nintendo eShop, under Donkey Kong Bananza and above Super Mario Party Jamboree + Jamboree TV, whatever that means to be honest.

“I want shorter games with worse graphics made by people who are paid more to work less and I’m not kidding”
Well, Drag x Drive is also kind of the result of that, and I admit that I’ve actually voted with my wallet and got that game in the end, despite initially not wanting it. Nintendo is finally back at making small eShop games, and I think that hasn’t been appreciated enough.

Dare I say I’m glad my $20 game isn’t filled with massive amounts of microtransactions, that everything is unlockable should you play good enough, and sure, the online might die, but honestly it feels like it found its audience when I look around. And it shouldn’t really be forgotten that motion control based games aren’t necessarily bad when the games are actually made for it in mind.