PlayStation Vita Critic Reviews

Drive Girls is for those Vita fans out there that are dying to play an action game from Tamsoft and can’t wait for some of their other games to come West. The game fails to deliver a proper fighting system or campaign to make it worth the short gameplay experience, but if you’re looking for decent graphics and cute anime girl illustrations then maybe this niche Vita game is just what you need.

Unless you have a strange Transformers fetish, it’s a game that you can easily skip.

With poor graphics, bad gameplay (despite some interesting points in the battle system) and bland story, Drive Girls fails to match the quality of the popular franchise Senran Kagura despite some more than evident similarities in concept. The driving parts don't look like part of a professional game.

Titles like Senran Kagura or the Hyperdimension Neptunia series are incredibly dumb, but are also entertaining. Despite their glaring flaws, they warm this cold heart in my chest. Drive Girls drops the ball on every front that could redeem it. It squanders its concept with poor stage design, ruining the sense of momentum. It takes what should be a simple hack and slash action game and complicates with the most poorly considered control scheme this side of playing Dark Souls with a Guitar Hero peripheral. Even the story, which could have been a redeeming factor by way of just being amiable nonsense, is tedious and dull. If Senran Kagura is the one that gets too drunk at a party and embarrasses itself to the amusement of onlookers, Drive Girls is the one that pukes on the host’s pets and is confrontationally annoying. It’s unpleasant for everyone and people just want it to be gone.

Drive Girls is a disappointing game in almost every aspect with only a few redeeming factors.

I’m not really sure who Drive Girls is for. It’s too short and generic to satisfy most fans of the genre. It fails on nearly every level, never able to outlive its initial gimmick. The game leaves its one joke of “ladies, but also cars” stranded amid a desert of awkward anime tropes and reiterated levels forcing you to relive the same Drive Girls gameplay loop forever. It’s not that Drive Girls is simply repetitive, it’s just somehow boring. And that’s not something I thought I’d say about a game where women transform into cars, fight bug-robots and lose their clothes.

Drive Girls is a hack and slash slog where you quite literally drive girls who transform into cars to fight evil bugs. It is every bit the stupid, ridiculous, freaky fun game that it sounds like, and has some guilty pleasure elements that can endear it to players even while they recognize it is a total wreck. Battles are unique, but ultimately boring, and a bad story and lackluster look makes Drive Girls a mostly forgettable mess.

Although Drive Girls looks like it could provide some crazy action and a charming world, it ultimately lacks in both of these categories. Instead, you're left with a subpar blend of beat 'em up combat and racing that feels like it belongs in the bargain bin.

Aside from a few very rare moments of fun, that’s ultimately the problem with Drive Girls. It has a unique premise but nothing else stands out, and what is left is a game that is neither very fun, very memorable, nor even interesting. It’s a game that I could only recommend to the utmost hardcore fans of niche games, and that’s knowing all the caveats. It’s just a title I couldn’t get into, I couldn’t enjoy, and ultimately felt like barely any effort was put into to make it engaging or stand out. The premise alone sounds so interesting, so its makes the final results hurt even more. This is one flat tire.