In most open-world racing games, drifting is an option—you can tune your car or buy a specialized drift machine to slide around corners in a cloud of your own smoke, if you wish. In Japanese drift masterit is the core of everything. This intriguing new racing game may not offer the multiplayer thrills of the crew, test drive and Forza horizons, but it feels pleasantly unique compared to those big dogs of the open-world genre. You’ll also soon be able to experience his recreation of Japan for yourself, as JDM just locked in the release date.
I covered the Japanese Drift Master last year because it immediately struck me as something different from those aforementioned predecessors. While the general approach of ‘pick location, recreate in a massive open world, fill it with desirable cars’ remains true in JDM, you won’t fill your garage full of Bugattis and Ferraris. Everything about it is as authentically Japanese as possible, and everything feeds into the country’s driving culture.
That means it’s only Japanese cars. Officially licensed vehicles from Mazda, Nissan and Subaru will be available to drive at launch, but developer Gaming Factory says it’s “not done” announcing new manufacturers and models. Of course you can also tune and customize cars.
As a single-player game, a lot of thought and effort has gone into JDM’s story. You play as Touma, “a Polish driver who dreams of making a name for himself in the local street racing scene.” His Japanese friends help establish him as a racer, but there will be fierce rivalries, romance and drama on his quest to become the top dog in the fictional Japanese region of Guntama.
While overworld events and races will of course progress the story, much of the narrative grunt comes in the form of an original, hand-drawn manga. “Each time the player participates in an event, pages of the comic book will guide them or build the story for what is to come,” Game Factory explains.
With 250km of roads and recreations of Japanese landmarks like Himeji Castle, Guntama looks like a stunning playground for all this sideways action. Despite its rich car culture and natural beauty, Japan has incredibly never been featured as a locale in an open-world racing game, as far as I can remember. Fortunately, JDM is going to bring that streak to an end.
If you want to dive in, you can do so now thanks to the Steam demo. But the wait for the full game won’t be long either.
The Japanese Drift Master will be released on Wednesday, March 26. It will be available on Steam, Gog and the Epic Games store.
If exploring huge, beautiful locations is your thing, check out some of the other great open-world games we recommend. To see what else is on the horizon, our upcoming PC games guide is the place to be.
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