1nsane

1NSANE, is one of those racing games I find hard to review. There is nothing stand out about it, nor is there anything really bad. It simply is average. Multiplayer is where the game shines, the game's fun level increases. Unfortunately for Single Player, it turns out to be quite frustrating: Enemy cars constantly have the edge on targets, and ram into you every chance they get, even in the first few seconds from starting. Though the do occasionally stall, or loose the idea of path finding. The best option appears to be to either quickly build up your own ability with the game, or force your way in front and remember each target before it appears. There are a number of game modes, from simple racing, to capture the flag and open environment checkpoint races. There's a variety of cars (and other vehicles), with some limited customisation skin wise as well. For their time, the open environments would of been fairly impressive, but the game is from that odd era where games don't always age too gracefully. A few years earlier or later, and there would be no complaint. Music is not memorable, but nether is it in your way. Though I did find the sound of the cars to be a little flat. Pick it up for the multiplayer aspect, if you are considering it.

1nsane is one of my favorite racing games because of the unorthodox game modes, open level design, and damage modelling on the cars. However there's going to be drama when setting up the controls. It's an old game so it only supports direct input. When I try to use my 360 controller the game won't recognize all of the functions on it.

It's insane (no pun intended) how impressive the softbody physics in this game are for its time. I don’t think I’ve ever played a racing game with softbody physics, especially not one from 2000s, aside from the modern BeamNG. The controls are challenging, sometimes even frustrating, but really satisfying when you pull off a good performance. The variety of modes is a fun addition, too. The maps feel a bit empty, but these days, that almost adds a liminal, eerie vibe, which I find quite appealing if you're into that sort of atmosphere. The map generator is a really cool concept as well. I can’t recall any other game with a feature like this (maybe Dirt 4 had one, if I remember correctly) The only minor annoyance in the campaign is that you can’t use the cars you’ve unlocked. As for the ones you do have access to, it feels like some are clear favorites over the others - especially those that don’t flip as easily and can handle climbing mountains better. I wasn’t able to play online, and I’m not sure if that’s still possible, but I believe multiplayer would be even more fun than single-player, so give it a shot if you have people to play with.

Thank you Codemasters! :)

Good memories, nice physics (for that time), challenging and fun at the same time. Plays nice with a keyboards, not nice with a controller. Doesn't run at 2560x1440, but works at 1080p with no problems.