Stuntman: Hollywood is a revival of the old arcade racing game, having you perform daring movie stunts to get the perfect take. I got to play a handful of levels, and despite having a mostly positive experience, I was left unsure how fulfilling the final version would be.
In Stuntman: Hollywood, you go through short levels, with the longest one I played taking at most 90 seconds, hitting your marks by doing stunts. These include drifting around corners, busting through parts of the environment, jumping off ramps, and hitting time gates. You earn stars based on the quality of your stunts, including extra stunts you perform during the level, for a total of up to 10. This serves as the basis for replayability, allowing you to rerun missions to earn the maximum amount.
Missions are based on Universal movie IPs, with Back to the Future featuring in one of the levels I played. I got to take the iconic DeLorean up to 88 MPH in front of the clock tower after dodging vans full of terrorists. Getting to go through an iconic movie, even if the level wasn’t exactly representative of the actual movie, was cool. Unfortunately, I was told that vehicles are locked to their specific franchise, so you can’t take an iconic car from one film to another.
The racing itself in Stuntman: Hollywood doesn’t feel as precise as other modern racing titles like Forza Horizon 6. For an arcade title more focused on stunts than racing, this doesn’t seem like an issue on the surface, but in practice, it felt like I was unable to perform the stunts I was being asked to do because I couldn’t get the car to move exactly the way I wanted. Stuntman: Hollywood is still in production, and 30 minutes isn’t a ton of time to master how a racing game feels, but first impressions weren’t great.
Missions called Odd Jobs, which are even smaller, bite-sized missions set within other movie properties. Regarding progression through the main missions, Saber wasn’t discussing how that works at this time, but my understanding is that it is just a series of missions. If you enjoy seeing classic movies in a video game or like a more objective-focused arcade racing game, Stuntman: Hollywood likely has something for you, although I need to see more before I’m completely sold.
Stuntman: Hollywood is coming to PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC. There is no release window at this time.
