Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds Review – Sonic’s Fastest, Fiercest Racer Yet

 Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds is a high-octane comeback for a series long stuck in Mario Kart’s slipstream. By plucking the best of the Blue Blur’s karting past, ditching the dead weight, and layering in fresh ideas like Travel Rings and Gadgets, Sonic Team has delivered its most inventive racer yet. Whether or not it dethrones Mario Kart is irrelevant – CrossWorlds is undoubtedly Sonic’s greatest racing game, and his best outing since Sonic Mania.

Make no mistake: Mario Kart will always be the benchmark against which other racers are judged. Nintendo’s karting formula works, and from the first turbo boost there’s evidence CrossWorlds is emulating that formula. E-Stadium, the opening event, is a stand-in for Mario Kart Stadium; the second course, Rainbow Garden, recalls Moo Moo Meadows. Colourful Mall wears the shopping centre inspiration of Mario Kart Wii’s Coconut Mall right down to its polished vinyl floor. The majority of CrossWorlds’ tracks do celebrate locations of past Sonic games but at surface level, with karting’s customary item boxes, boost pads, and mid-air kart flips, Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds appears a Mario Kart re-skinned.

To combat this perception, Sonic Team are leaning into the mascot’s trademark speed and over-the-top flair, creating a racer that feels faster, flashier, and more unpredictable than any pedal Mario has ever put to metal. Once quicker racing classes are unlocked, CrossWorlds comes into its own: tracks whip past in kaleidoscopic colour that washes through the eyes in vision smudging motion blur, whilst looping tarmac conjures the same stomach-churning sensations as WipEout’s ridiculous mach-speeds.

Sonic’s trademark speed is a thrilling presence, but CrossWorlds’ new Rivals system takes that blistering pace and weaponises it. Before every event, the game chooses a Rival to benchmark my performance against, ensuring every race becomes a high-stakes duel that grows in intensity the stronger my Rival is. Plus, the faster they go, the faster the field seems to move with them, creating races where it felt like I was clawing for every inch of tarmac. Rival battles provide some of CrossWorlds’ best moments: wheel-to-wheel slugfests where my adversary is just out of reach. They’re scrappy, frenzied, and laced with trash-talking bite, with close photo finishes injecting extra tension even if the race win is gone.

And if Rivals fuel CrossWorlds’ competition, Gadgets are its nitro boost. With over seventy to unlock by completing races, these Gadgets equip to vehicles to modify their performance: everything from speed boosts and air trick buffs, to increased offensive item drops, and much more. Every attachment modifies a kart’s behaviour in meaningful ways, with tangible changes that are felt through the controller.

"CrossWorlds is a celebration of Sonic’s heritage, with numerous tracks taking inspiration from iconic locations of the hedgehog’s past."

Before long, I was crafting full builds; I transformed basic rides into hypersonic bullets built for straight-line dominance, or hulking cruisers which I outfitted specifically to disrupt everyone else’s lap time. If I wanted to race as a drift specialist, air trick technician, or precision cornerer, well, there was a Gadget combo to match. It’s easily one of CrossWorld’s most compelling features and, together with Rivals, it’s where the game’s strategic depth lies.

Equally satisfying is the variability applied to cosmetic decoration. A huge palette of colours, panel textures, decals, horns, auras, and more ensures each kart I crafted felt like my own. Furthermore, chassis can be mixed and matched front-to-back to create drives which combine the performance stats of both. First, I wanted a sleek craft to chase leaderboard times. Then, I combined the ugliest chassis parts to create an absurd monstrosity for ramming the competition. All-in-all, I enjoyed my time tinkering. One of my favourite creations is a ring-stealing bully; an intimidating black tank of a machine, spec’d out for maximum disruption. My only gripe is that chassis classes can’t be combined; that is, a hammering front-end can’t be fused to a nimble rear. Sonic Team wants to maintain a balance across the grid between raw speed, dexterity, and power, after all. This isn’t a major issue come race time anyway, as, should I take to the track in my jet-black battering ram, I can select any racer skilled in steering to counteract its sluggish turning.

And once the countdown ends and I attempt to execute the perfect burnout, I swiftly discover that CrossWorld’s surreal track collection is – for the most part – a constant reminder that this is Sonic’s world. There’s only a couple of duds that sully this selection, namely Wonder Museum and Sonic Unleashed’s Market Street – purely for their underwhelming world design rather than their layout. On the whole, this is the strongest lineup of any Sonic racer, and I say that despite a handful of new locations flying too close to Nintendo’s sun.

See, the key is visual identity: CrossWorlds is a celebration of Sonic’s heritage, with numerous tracks taking inspiration from iconic locations of the hedgehog’s past. Standouts include Frontiers’ Kronos Island, Adventure 2’s Radical Highway, Shadow the Hedgehog’s Digital Circuit, and Forces’ Mystic Jungle.

However, the real showstoppers are the CrossWorld sprints themselves. After a typically chaotic opening lap, drivers are catapulted through Travel Rings onto entirely new stretches of track before seamlessly looping back to the original course. At first, I was worried these detours would feel like a gimmick. However, each transformation shakes up the race without derailing its flow, demonstrating the care Sonic Team has taken to add unpredictability. On lap two, CrossWorlds’ races could have descended into unfettered anarchy. Instead, remarkably, there’s restraint on show; a welcome fever dream rather than lurid nightmare.

Variety doesn’t stop at the CrossWorld tracks, as the original course is dramatically re-shaped by lap three. A mid-lap straight might have tumbled away, forcing drivers to switch to aerial racing. Or a twisting back section could be flooded, shifting karts into wave-jumping speedboats to keep the breakneck momentum flowing. New racing lines emerge, threading through additional boost pads, whilst extra hazards spill onto the tarmac. These third lap shenanigans intertwine spectacle and gameplay majestically, making each race as much about navigating the chaos as it is about seeing the chequered flag first.

"Single-player content is more traditional: completing four-race grand prix events showered me with currency to spend on customisations and cosmetics."

CrossWorlds’ selection of modes rounds out the package nicely, though not all land equally. The offline multiplayer Race Park party mode is where things get loud. Here, team-based objectives layer over the core sprint-to-the-finish formula, pitting two or more players against a convoy of AI rivals to collect the most rings, land the most bumps, or battle it out with the most extreme powerups, and so on. It’s chaotic fun, but can verge on sensory overload; when the screen is bursting with effects and the audio is popping with ring-collection and ring-loss sounds, I found it easy to lose track of what’s actually happening. My partner felt the same; at times we felt less like racers and more like bowling balls bouncing down a lane with the bumpers up.

Single-player content is more traditional: completing four-race grand prix events showered me with currency to spend on customisations and cosmetics. It’s a tried-and-true progression loop that kept me chasing the next upgrade. Time Trial mode offers a nice twist on the classic, requiring boost items be collected and deployed strategically to climb to the top of the leaderboard. With the track morphing between laps just like regular races, even time attacks offer elements of unpredictability. In my time spent with Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds before tackling this review, I like to think I haven’t unlocked all the speed-enhancing Gadgets yet, as – despite my most streamlined efforts – I’m still ten-plus seconds away from those ever-elusive S-tier times.

Overall, CrossWorlds is a burst of colour and energy – exactly what a Sonic racer should be. It’s undeniably vibrant, with bright, mostly readable tracks – save for the oft-overdone motion blur – and expressive Sonic models that are constantly animated, waving, jeering, and reacting mid-race. In my opinion, the game is best experienced in performance mode, which delivers a smooth frame rate that perfectly complements the game’s rapid pace. Quality mode promises higher fidelity textures and reflections, but at these speeds I never found myself wishing for more visual detail. Either mode ran consistently on my PS5, but performance mode simply feels right for a game this fast.

"Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds doesn’t just redefine the series, it finally gives Sonic a kart racer with its own identity."

Likewise, CrossWorlds’ soundtrack is jaunty, bouncing, and unmistakably Sonic. The constant energy of the music pairs beautifully with the on-screen chaos. Dialogue between racers is snappy, sometimes genuinely funny, and cleverly personalised, but it can get repetitive. Sonic in particular has a habit of dropping the same “not bad, not bad” quip what feels like dozens of times per race, which starts to grate come race’s end. Sound effects, on the other hand, are pure nostalgia, from the familiar ring chimes to the bumpers, everything hits the right notes.

Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds doesn’t just redefine the series, it finally gives Sonic a kart racer with its own identity. By embracing speed, strategy, and pure chaos, Sonic Team has built a game that feels unmistakably “Sonic” rather than simply chasing Mario Kart’s tail. It’s a racer I can see myself returning to for months, whether I’m shaving milliseconds off time trials, building ridiculous new gadget setups, or squinting through another round of Race Park mayhem.

This game was reviewed on the PlayStation 5.