Common Sense Media Review
By Carolyn Koh
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based on child development research. How do we rate?
Simple racing and collections game can get pricey.
Parents Need to Know
Why Age 7+?
Any Positive Content?
Where to Play
Videos and Photos
Hotwheels Racing Circuit
Parent and Kid Reviews
What's It About?
In HOTWHEELS RACING CIRCUIT, an online, mulitplayer, bowser-based game, there are two tracks and several racing games that are free to play. Kids can also customize their own car for free. Other customization requires credits which are earned by racing. Each race requires 8 players and if there aren't enough kids online at the time, the computer will fill up the rest of the slots. There are also 8 trophies for every race, so kids will always win something in each race they participate in.
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Is It Any Good?
Like many car games, Hotwheels Racing Circuit is about collecting cars and making your cars look cool. If kids are already Hotwheels fans, this may be a way to extend their hobby. The subscription commitment is for a year and costs $29.99, which is expensive when compared to the 99 cents cost of most physical hotwheel cars. However the graphics are really good, which helps to make these toy cars come alive. This game is best played on new, faster computers and kids with slow machines, may get frustrated. They may have to pop open a new window and the browser may have to be minimized in order to play the game.
Online interaction: Kids can look at each others profiles and garages but there is no actual interaction as there isn't any text chat.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about setting computer time limits. How many races do you want to play today?
Families can also talk about collecting as a hobby and the differences between collecting physical toys and virtual ones.
Game Details
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