HOT WHEELS™ Infinite Rush · published
Welcome back everyone! It’s Domenico Celenza from Milestone, Game Director of HOT WHEELS™ Infinite Rush and I’m back to help you discover even more of the features, activities, and secrets waiting for you in the game. Today, we're going to take a closer look at the different HOT WHEELS™ Infinite Rush vehicle classes, what sets them apart, and everything the game’s extensive vehicle collection has to offer.
HOT WHEELS™ Infinite Rush features four different vehicle classes: Drifters, Speeders, Titans, and Versatiles. Each one has its own driving style and unique approach to Boost Charge management. To tell you more about them, I’d like to bring in Francesco Riggi, Milestone’s Lead Game Designer for HOT WHEELS™ Infinite Rush. Francesco, can you walk us through the thinking behind these vehicle classes?
Hey everyone! It's great to be here! As Domenico said, HOT WHEELS™ Infinite Rush has four different vehicle classes, and each one plays differently. That made us change the way we approached track design. Once we stopped trying to make every vehicle class fit the same tracks, we had much more freedom to experiment and create tracks tailored to each vehicle class.
We even developed a dedicated set of design principles for each vehicle class. By building around their strengths and weaknesses, we were able to shape everything from track layouts to interactive objects and animated modules, creating challenges that highlight what makes each class unique.Of course, this also meant introducing a stricter rule where players compete only against Hot Wheels from the same vehicle class in events. This allowed us to create tracks that feel far more distinct and better showcase each class’s identity.Let me give you a little more insight into each class’s characteristics and how they influenced track design:Drifters excel at drifting and offer some of the most precise handling in the game, making them incredibly responsive through corners. They can also build boost quickly while sliding, but maintaining high speeds isn't their strongest suit. That's why their tracks are designed around vehicle control, featuring winding routes and a bunch of different kinds of turns that encourage you to master the art of drifting.Speeders, on the other hand, are built for pure speed. Their boost increases as they accelerate, but drifting comes at a cost, as they tend to lose a significant amount of momentum through corners. Because of this, we have designed their tracks around maintaining top speeds to maximize boost gain. You'll find long straights, challenging corners that can be tackled either cleanly or with a well-timed drift, and obstacles that reward players who can stay on the ideal racing line. Choosing when to preserve your speed and when to spend boost becomes a key part of mastering this class.Titans prioritize power over speed and agility. Their defining strength is their exceptional boost capacity, making boost management the key to mastering this vehicle class. The challenge is finding the right balance: maximizing your time using boost without completely draining it, as doing so will temporarily slow you down. This mechanic became the foundation of their track design. You'll encounter animated modules and interactive objects that affect boost management, all integrated into layouts optimized for boost charging and consumption.Finally, Versatiles. As the name suggests, they can adapt to almost any situation. They offer a balanced mix of speed, handling, and power. Unlike the other vehicle classes, their boost is divided into charges, with each button press consuming a full charge. This flexibility is reflected in their tracks, which feature frequent transitions between orange track modules and the environment, to highlight their ability to handle different surfaces. Their layouts are a mix of straight lines and winding sections, challenging players to make the most of both their handling and charge-based boost.
Thank you, Francesco. We'll come back to track design in a bit, but for now let's talk about how these vehicle classes come together during gameplay.
That's where the Rush Squad comes in. It’s a team of four Hot Wheels, one from each class. Think of it as a dedicated selection from your collection that you can access at any time while free-roaming. With the press of a button, you can instantly switch between vehicle classes, allowing you to always tackle free-roaming activities with the Hot Wheels best suited for the challenge ahead.One of our goals was to make exploration feel as seamless as possible, which is why we wanted players to be able to switch vehicles instantly instead of navigating through menus every time they encountered a new activity.You'll receive your first Rush Squad at the start of the game, and as your collection grows, you'll be able to customize it with your favorite vehicles through the Garage menu.Every island can be explored with whichever Hot Wheels you prefer, regardless of vehicle class, and the same goes for free-roaming activities. Naturally, some activities are better suited to specific classes – a Drifter, for example, is perfect for Drift Stunts – but we always wanted players to have the freedom to experiment and explore in their own way.Events and races are a different story, though. As mentioned before, you will be able to access a specific event only with the dedicated vehicle class for which the track has been designed. Our main goal has always been to keep the gameplay as fluid as possible. That’s why we have created a clear distinction between free-roaming activities, which can be completed with any vehicle for a seamless and never interrupted experience, and events, which require a dedicated track to be loaded and virtual opponents to be prepared. Before hitting the track for an event, the game will have you select a vehicle from the required vehicle class, even if it's different from the one you were using while exploring in free roam.On Day One, September 10, you will be able to discover and collect over 150 Hot Wheels. Building a roster that large was already a challenge, but categorizing every vehicle into four distinct classes added an entirely new layer of complexity. One of our goals was to have a roster that felt balanced across all vehicle classes, so we worked to ensure that each one featured the same number of Hot Wheels. At the same time, we didn't want to force vehicles into vehicle classes where they didn't belong. Finding the right place for every vehicle often felt like solving a giant puzzle, but the result is a collection that stays true to the personality of every Hot Wheels vehicle while offering plenty of variety across all four classes.Building your perfect Rush Squad is only part of the journey. Each island is home to a rival Rush Squad, made up of four vehicles (one for each vehicle class) including three Rushers and a Rush Master: the crew and boss standing between you and the title of ultimate Rush Master. To challenge them, you'll first need to earn points by taking part in Main Events. As you progress, you'll unlock head-to-head battles against the island's Rushers. Defeat the entire crew, and you'll earn the chance to face the Rush Master in a final showdown, an intense head-to-head that will put all your skills to the test.Of course, every victory comes with a reward. Defeating a Rusher or Rush Master adds their Hot Wheels to your collection, giving you even more options to expand your roster and customize your Rush Squad. We wanted players to feel free to experiment and discover their own way of playing. Whether you're exploring the islands, completing events, or hunting for new Hot Wheels, the goal is to let you progress at your own pace.Once you've built a collection of Hot Wheels, the next step is making them your own. You’ll be able to customize both your vehicles’ performance and style. As you complete events and challenges, you'll unlock perks to equip on your Hot Wheels. And since Francesco worked closely on these systems, I'll let him tell you more about them.
Here I am again! When designing the perk system, one of our main goals was to put player expression at the center of the experience. Rather than simply making your Hot Wheels stronger, we wanted players to be able to tune their vehicles around their own driving style and racing strategies.
The perk system is divided into four ranks (C, B, A, and S) and follows one core principle: the more powerful a perk is, the greater its trade-off becomes. This helps keep the gameplay balanced while still offering meaningful customization options. There are a lot of perks to choose from, and since you can equip only one perk per rank, you'll have to choose wisely to find the perfect setup. Most perks can be used across all vehicle classes, while the S rank slot is unique to each class. To go a little deeper, each rank focuses on a different aspect of vehicle customization. C rank perks affect handling and vehicle responsiveness and have little impact on the gameplay without any drawbacks. B rank perks focus more on boost and dash, introducing the first trade-offs. A rank perks, on the other hand, have a much greater impact on vehicle performance, modifying physics parameters such as boost management and top speed in exchange for more significant compromises. For example, you can improve the drift but get less boost; or you can get more boost, but it depletes more quickly.Finally, S rank perks sit at the top of the system and are designed specifically for a vehicle class. Just like our approach to track design, the goal wasn't to change the identity of a vehicle class, but to push its defining characteristics even further. These perks introduce dramatic gameplay twists alongside equally impactful trade-offs. To give you some examples, a Speeder can drastically increase its boost recharge while racing at high speed, but its brakes become much more reactive, requiring great precision to balance this new braking power. Or you can significantly improve a Titan boost recharge, so it will take even less to get a full charge, but if you end up overcharging the vehicle, the slow-down will be much longer.As you can probably tell, this is a complex system, so I suggest taking a look in-game on September 10 to discover all the possibilities that the perks can give you. Our goal was to make the experience as customizable as possible for everyone, and we are sure you are going to find something that meets and enhances your playstyle. With that said, I'll hand things back to Domenico, because performance is only one side of customization!
Thanks, Francesco. Of course, customization goes beyond performance. We also wanted players to have plenty of ways to customize the look and feel of their Hot Wheels. In addition to perks, you’ll be able to change boost and drift sounds, as well as visual effects, giving your favorite Hot Wheels an extra touch of personality.
And customization extends even further through a variety of editors dedicated to stickers, liveries, and wheels. Whether you prefer subtle adjustments or more distinctive designs, you'll have plenty of options to make your collection your own. At the same time, we wanted every Hot Wheels to retain its original identity. That's why, while you’ll be able to customize both wheels and rims to your liking, wheel size remains tied to the original vehicle design. And that's only part of the customization story. In the next episode, we'll take a closer look at the Track Builder and the tools you'll use to create your own tracks.That’s all for the second episode of Beyond the Track: The Dev Logs. I hope you enjoyed this closer look at some of the features and design choices behind HOT WHEELS™ Infinite Rush. I will see you again soon.