GamesRacingGamescom 2024My Gamescom highlight was DeathSprint 66, a fast, fluid on-foot racing game that’s like “The Running Man meets Mario Kart"When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
GamesRacingGamescom 2024My Gamescom highlight was DeathSprint 66, a fast, fluid on-foot racing game that’s like “The Running Man meets Mario Kart"When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
As I play DeathSprint 66, I’m no longer in a small demo room tucked away in a hall in the Koelnmesse at Gamescom. I’m instead transported into a dystopian gameshow, racing on-foot across a track that’s hellbent on killing me. Laser traps of all shapes and sizes threaten to slice me to smithereens with one wrong turn, while I also have to contend with menacing twirling blades that jut out on walls, and competing bot racers that aren’t above shoving me.
I fall into a flow state as I try to survive, drifting around tight bends, hitting Surge to boost, and taking note of the direction of traps as I wall-run and propel myself over to a higher track. When I land on a rail with a well-timed jump, gliding across it and avoiding several traps in a row as I go, a sense of satisfaction washes over me. The fluid, fast pace of the race, coupled with the chaos swirling on screen, constantly keeps me on my toes. I’m so invested in reaching the finish line, in fact, that I even notice myself leaning in my seat to mirror the direction of every twist and turn of the race.
I can’t remember the last time I clicked with a game so quickly. But Deathsprint 66 is one of the biggest highlights of my Gamescom experience this year, and one of the best surprises for me personally.
Fast and Furious
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
I’ve lost count of the amount of hours I’ve spent over the last several years playing Mario Kart 8. As a game I play regularly against my sister, nothing has come close to replacing Nintendo’s competitive racing game. But DeathSprint 66 taps into a similar kind of satisfying chaos as Mario Kart - albeit with its own distinctive dystopian edge - and I can already see myself playing it again and again. Perhaps the comparison shouldn’t be so surprising - when I say it reminds me of Deathrace 2000 without cars, game director Andrew Willans compares DeathSprint to “The Running Man meets Mario Kart”.
Gamescom 2024(Image credit: Xbox Game Studios)For more of our hands-on previews and exclusive interviews, visit ourGamescom 2024coverage hub.
Gamescom 2024
(Image credit: Xbox Game Studios)For more of our hands-on previews and exclusive interviews, visit ourGamescom 2024coverage hub.
(Image credit: Xbox Game Studios)
For more of our hands-on previews and exclusive interviews, visit ourGamescom 2024coverage hub.
Not unlike the item boxes you can smash into in Mario Kart, for example, DeathSprint 66 serves up its own item markers that will give you one of a number of different useful tools against other racers at random. Because reaching the finish line isn’t all that matters in Sumo Newcastle’s racer - causing more havoc and sprinting through the track in style will please the audience. From throwing out a giant round saw blade to slice through anyone that’s ahead of you, to activating a shield that makes you invincible against laser traps for a short duration, deploying one at just the right time can make all the difference.
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
DeathSprint also boasts several different tracks and events in a variety of PvP and PvE formats. I get to try out an assortment of single-player PvE modes aptly known as “Episodes” to feed into the game show set up during my demo session. I kick things off with “Killing Time”, a timed challenge that sees me start off with 15 seconds on the clock. I have to race my way across the track to rush through rings that give me more precious seconds. Of course, traps do get in my way, and after one too many, my head suddenly explodes when my time has run out.
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Finding my flow
Image1of4(Image credit: Secret Mode)(Image credit: Secret Mode)(Image credit: Secret Mode)(Image credit: Secret Mode)
Image1of4(Image credit: Secret Mode)(Image credit: Secret Mode)(Image credit: Secret Mode)(Image credit: Secret Mode)
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(Image credit: Secret Mode)(Image credit: Secret Mode)(Image credit: Secret Mode)(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)(Image credit: Secret Mode)(Image credit: Secret Mode)(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
(Image credit: Secret Mode)
Willans tells me he’s always been a fan of snowboarding and wanted to create an experience that will help players find the satisfying flowstate that can bring. DeathSprint 66 definitely delivers in that respect; I once again find my flow as I’m drawn into the mayhem of the Bloodbath episodes, and I frequently lose all sense of time and place because of how much fun I’m having throughout my session.
As I switch between modes, I see some announcements on screen from a fictional in-game news channel, Bachman Media Network. It’s through the “BBC news-like banners”, as Willans puts it, that we’ll learn more about the backstory of DeathSprint 66 and the futuristic world setting that’s home to this bloodthirsty show. The name of network is even a playful nod to its inspiration, with Willans highlighting that Bachman is the pseudonym Stephen King used when The Running Man book was first published.
Spine looks like a slick as hell action game that channels John Woo movies and the freeflow combat of the Batman Arkham series.
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