HOT WHEELS™ Infinite Rush

Introduction

HOT WHEELS™ Infinite Rush, developed and published by Milestone S.r.l., released on Steam on 10 September 2026 at NZ$84.95. It's the third entry in Milestone's Hot Wheels racing series, following Hot Wheels Unleashed and Hot Wheels Unleashed 2: Turbocharged, and it marks the series' biggest structural change yet: rather than racing across contained, toy-track environments built inside oversized rooms, players now explore four semi-open-world islands, each built around its own theme, collecting cars, gears and stickers while working through elimination races, stunt events and daredevil challenges. The game ships on Windows only, with full controller support including DualShock and DualSense, and offers single-player, online multiplayer, online PvP and split-screen PvP across cross-platform play. It debuted with a launch review base of 46 total reviews at the time of writing, 36 of them favourable, landing the game at Mostly Positive on Steam's own scale.

What's working: an ambitious open-world evolution with real nostalgia appeal

What comes through most clearly across HOT WHEELS™ Infinite Rush's favourable reviews is how consistently reviewers credit the open-world shift with genuinely reinventing the series rather than just padding it out. One English-language reviewer sums up the appeal directly: "This is where I hoped we'd end up after Hot Wheels Unleashed 1 & 2 — while I liked both of those quite a bit, the friction between races really pulled me out of it over and over again. Now that's not all be relieved here, but it is a much tighter experience overall and a more seamless one." A separate reviewer frames the whole experience more simply: "Forza Horizon + Hot Wheels. Highway 35 and Acceleracers cars makes the game so fun for old fans plus some 2000s classics." Another reviewer, writing shortly after buying the game on launch day for the first time since GTA V years earlier, describes it as the most excited they'd been for a release in years, having already cleared the first island's collectibles.

The nostalgia factor draws repeated praise on its own terms. One reviewer writes plainly: "So much fun and so many Highway 35 and Acceleracers vehicles," while a Japanese reviewer offers a more technical appreciation of what changed under the hood, translated: "The four semi-open-world islands mostly play like Forza Horizon... the vehicle categories were simplified down from the previous game's larger roster to just four, and each behaves differently, so you switch between them depending on the event." A detailed Simplified Chinese reviewer goes further, giving a thorough breakdown of the redesigned nitro system across the game's four vehicle classes, translated: "Milestone very cleverly uses nitro to distinguish the different vehicle types from the previous game, so that they don't just differ statistically but also have their own distinct playstyle," specifically praising how the balanced, speed, heavy and drift classes each regenerate and spend boost differently. Multiple reviewers separately praise the soundtrack unprompted, one writing simply: "OMG THE MUSIC IS SO GOOOOOOD!!!! Whomever made this soundtrack deserve a freakin' raise," and reviewers confirm the game runs well on Steam Deck and SteamOS out of the box with default settings.

The honest problems: a heavier feel, aggressive monetisation, and launch bugs

Set against that praise, HOT WHEELS™ Infinite Rush's review sample carries specific, repeated complaints from reviewers who know the series well. The most technical comes from a reviewer who directly compares handling across all three games, translated from context: "They changed game engines from UE4 to UE5, and with that change they changed the physics of the game. Cars are heavier, using the brake stops you much faster, and overall the game feels much slower. With motion blur off in both this game and Hot Wheels Unleashed 2, I can say for an absolute certainty there are huge differences in how the cars feel to drive." A German reviewer raises a related complaint more bluntly, translated: "I only played it briefly, and I can tell you: get the predecessors, they're better, and you can get them much cheaper through key sellers or Steam sales... the graphics are trash, just like the handling, and above all it's just not fun."

Monetisation draws specific, repeated criticism. One reviewer who praised the core loop still adds a pointed caveat: "Forza Horizon + Hot Wheels... Only down side is it's obviously they're holding some of those cars behind paywall DLC." A separate reviewer who enjoyed the exploration nonetheless writes, translated: "The price is not justified I would say, a bit too expensive for what it is, especially considering they are selling a couple DLCs (and probably more to come)." A reviewer who had bought every piece of Acceleracers DLC for the previous game specifically calls the new title "a poor man's Forza," adding: "It gives you lots of padding that you could call 'gameplay' but it's somehow less stimulating than playing with actual Hot Wheels toys on your floor. Want to race around a giant empty open world and collect 300 gears? Wanna pay [NZ]$50 to do that?" More than one reviewer separately reports the game's use of Epic Online Services blocks inviting Steam friends directly into a multiplayer lobby, and a detailed English-language review criticises inconsistent per-event handling rules, describing a drift event that requires maximum handling assist despite being scored as a straight time trial. Other reviewers report launch-week technical problems independently, including fatal crashes that prevent getting past the loading screen, a frame rate locked at 30 tied to VRR display settings, and a track creator restricted to whichever island a player starts on rather than any unlocked environment.

Verdict

HOT WHEELS™ Infinite Rush backs up a Mostly Positive launch with a genuinely ambitious structural evolution for the series: reviewers across six different languages credit its four-island open-world format, nostalgic Acceleracers and Highway 35 car roster, and soundtrack with making it feel like the series' strongest entry yet for players willing to meet it on its own terms. Its honest problems are specific rather than vague, however. Reviewers who know the previous two games well report a heavier, slower feel tied directly to the engine switch from Unreal Engine 4 to Unreal Engine 5, multiple reviewers flag real monetisation concerns around its season pass and paywalled DLC stacked on an already expensive base price, and others report launch-week bugs ranging from blocking crashes to a restricted track creator. None of that erases what a Mostly Positive reception is responding to in the game's open-world ambition, but buyers should go in aware of both the price and the engine-switch complaints from longtime fans. This is a cautious recommendation for series fans and arcade-racing fans specifically drawn to its open-world format and nostalgic roster.

Wanderer callout

A reviewer who owns every DLC for the previous game in a series, and uses that direct, invested history to explain precisely why the new entry's open-world padding feels less satisfying than the format it replaced, rather than just calling the sequel worse, is exactly the kind of grounded, comparative evidence Wanderer treats as more valuable than a snap first impression: it comes from someone with the most to lose by being wrong about where the series should go next.