Old School Rally review: The essential rallying nostalgia hit

Racing to get home from primary school in the Winter after being picked up by my dad, we load up Colin McRae Rally on the PS1 to squeeze in a few rallies before mum gets home.

We start a new championship and dad is at his fluent best through New Zealand, Greece and Austria, completely pummelling the opposition, as I watch on in youthful awe at his ability to navigate the Toyota Corolla so flawlessly on all terrains.

Next up is Australia and for the fourth stage, dad always insists on having all the lights off when there's one at night so he can see better.

Of course, this is the moment mum comes through the front door, taking her coat off and asking why it's so dark as she comes into the living room before seeing my dad and I illuminated by the rear red lights of the Corolla and the orange dust of Australia.

I simply beam at her, illuminated by the glow of the TV and she smiles, being respectfully quiet while dad is in the zone. He wins the stage by 17 seconds before greeting mum, saying he'll be there in "just a moment", dominates the final two stages to make it four rally wins from four before we save (twice, of course), all in time for us to start making dinner.

This is just one of the many memories Old School Rally evokes for me, a new rally game made in the style of 90s classics such as Colin McRae Rally and V-Rally, hitting me with the biggest dose of rallying nostalgia I've felt for a long, long time, if ever.

And I love it.

To note, a PS5 review code was provided by the publisher. Old School Rally has been available through Early Access but this focuses on the full release of the game.

Old School Rally delivers rally games nostalgia in spades / Frozen Lake Games, Astrolabe Games

What modes are in Old School Rally?

There are a handful of modes in Old School Rally, including Rally, Time Trial and Versus.

In Rally, you compete in different rallies containing different stages across 10 different locations and have to beat the time in each stage to progress and unlock your reward car at the end. You also earn coins this way which can be used to purchase other cars. This is fun but can feel a bit repetitive in longer play sessions.

Time trial is what it says on the tin - where you aim to complete each stage in the fastest time possible. You can compete with others for bragging rights here.

Then there's Versus mode where players can race against other players via split-screen or against CPU. This gives it much more of a V-Rally feel to it than Colin McRae Rally.

It would have been nice for there to be some sort of Career or Championship mode instead of beating set times to progress and earn rewards all the time to give it a bit more longevity.

In terms of content, there are 32 different cars that span different eras of rallying, all with liveries that are designed to look like, but not replicate, some of the most famous ones. There's a Photo Mode where you can captures these cars in action too.

Old School Rally will take you across 10 different countries across gravel, tarmac and snow, including Finland, Kenya, Japan and the United Kingdom. There are also 21 music tracks in the game which fuel that nostalgic feeling from the moment you hear a breakbeat track in the introduction video which can all be enjoyed in the Music Player.

There's dynamic weather too, including day, night, rain, fog and snow and these have been given the PS1-style makeover you'd expect.

Versus mode feels much more like V-Rally than Colin McRae Rally / Frozen Lake Games, Astrolabe Games

How does Old School Rally look and perform?

Old School Rally is intentionally designed to look like a PS1 game and it's pulled off with aplomb here. That familiar feeling from 25+ years ago is recaptured here in spades, both through how it looks and how the game is designed.

The way the main menu is designed is something straight out of Colin McRae Rally. Stage information is used for the loading screen and the HUD is even reminiscent of the Codemasters classic.

The performance is incredibly stable, both through its resolution and frame rate which runs at 60fps, and I have not encountered any problems during my time with the game at all on this front.

There are some sections where it appears the game renders in front of you but having played Colin McRae Rally extensively, this was a common occurrence and I feel as though it's very intentional here. Each stage is like a corridor instead of there being an open world behind it to capture that nostalgic feeling too. The attention to detail in that regard is commendable.

The sound is great too - as previously mentioned, the music transports you straight back to the 90s / early 00s (which can be toggled on and off if desired) and the cars sound pretty decent as well.

Each class of car has its own distinct style with each car having its own slight variation of it. It helps to give cars individuality on that front beyond their appearance.

Grip on different road surfaces only varies slightly / Frozen Lake Games, Astrolabe Games

What's the gameplay like in Old School Rally?

Old School Rally feels like an arcade rally game - although it takes its cues from games that aimed to be much more realistic, such as Colin McRae Rally, it feels much more arcade-like.

Looking at Old School Rally through a critical lens, there is a bit of a difference how cars behave across gravel, tarmac and snow in terms of grip levels, including what the weather is like, but there isn't much beyond that.

Generally, cars actually feel really grippy on whatever surface you're on and it doesn't quite translate when compared to older rallying games in this regard where you were pretty much sideways all the time.

Having said that, each car has different ratings for acceleration, top speed, handling and brakes and they do feel noticeably different from each other despite the previous gripe. It's incredibly fun and approachable to throw these cars around different stages across varying countries to find out which cars do and don't work for you.

It's very much a sit back and enjoy kind of arcade racer instead of being on the edge of your seat constantly. It's easy to pick up and play and smash out a Rally instead of thinking you have to dedicate a good chunk of time into it in each sitting which is refreshing.

Your co-driver is inconsistent at best... Sometimes calls don't reflect the angle of the corner, are called way too late and sometimes he doesn't even call out pacenotes for a corner at all. I actually found him to be a bit more of a hinderance than help.

But these issues were never enough to dampen my experience or to stop me having fun throughout and that's so key here.

There is an element of damage which seems to slightly affect power output when you crash into things and one thing to bear in mind in Rally is that you can only make repairs after two stages.

If you played Colin McRae Rally or V-Rally games in the 90s / early 00s, this game is essential to check out / Frozen Lake Games, Astrolabe Games

What's the verdict on Old School Rally?

Nostalgia can be a funny thing and cloud judgment of video games - and admittedly it's swallowed me whole here as I just can't get enough of Old School Rally despite its shortcomings.

It's really fun to pick up and thrash different cars around for as long or as little as you'd like. It's an arcade racer that feels as though it's aimed exactly at people like me who've been playing rallying games for 25+ years.

Granted, it's very much a title focused on delivering nostalgia without the biggest amount of substance to it with the absence of any sort of Career or Championship mode.

But it so successfully delivers that nostalgia that, as it takes up less than 1GB on my PS5, it will undoubtedly be staying on my bulging hard drive ready for me to sit back and enjoy it whenever I fancy a quick dose of nostalgia of playing rally games with my dad.

7/10

Old School Rally is out on PS5, PS4, Nintendo Switch and PC on 4 December.

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