World of Outlaws: Dirt Racing 24 Review

Image: Monster Games

World of Outlaws: Dirt Racing 24 has just landed, and it is another blast through some of the coolest dirt ovals in the United States. I have played a lot of the previous game, and I have played some of the new game now, so so I will give you my first impressions and if the game is worth picking it up.

World of Outlaws is developed by Monster Games, who are owned by iRacing. The studio has produced a bunch of NASCAR games in the past, and are responsible for the upcoming NASCAR 25 game that is set to launch next year. The next game will run on Unreal Engine, so I imagine this is the last game from them using Unity Engine.

Donny Schatz (left) and Brandon Sheppard are the cover stars for WoO 24. Image: Monster Games

Content​

This year’s game includes a number of cars, the main one being the 410 sprint car. This one is super difficult to drive, but it features a bunch of the famous drivers from the World of Outlaws. Missing this year are some drivers like Brad Sweet and Australian James McFadden, however, as there is a breakaway rival sprintcar series called High Limit Racing in which both are running. At the time of writing, Sweet is actually leading the overall standings there, with McFadden in seventh position.

Back to World of Outlaws, though. Also included are 360 and 305 sprint cars, which are slightly slower than the 410, as well as the Super Late Model, Pro Late Model, the Street stock, the UMP Modified and big block modified. A new addition for this year is the 410 non-wing – a full sprint car without the wing, as the name suggests. Of course, it is hard to drive.
Also new is the Micro Sprint, a little sprint car with a motorbike engine and a bunch of gears. These are cute and fun to drive.

The Midget is also included in the game, as it was part of a DLC pack last year.

In terms of tracks, it’s got all the same tracks as the previous game, with Lernerville, Lincoln and the Chilli Bowl getting added in last year’s DLC – and Kern and Millbridge getting added brand new for this game.

World of Outlaws 24 Car List​

• 410 Sprint Car
• 410 Non-wing Sprint Car
• 360 Sprint Car
• 305 Sprint Car
• WoO Late Model
• Pro Late Model
• Street Stock
• Dirtcar UMP Modified
• Dirtcar Big Block Modified
• Midget
• Dirt Micro Sprint Car

Of course, there are plenty of playgrounds for these cars – 49, to be exact. The track lineup includes dirt racing staples like Eldora, the Chili Bowl or Lucas Oil Speedway.

World of Outlaws 24 Track List​

• Arrowwood Motor Speedway
• Baxterville Speedway
• Bristol Motor Speedway
• Cedar Lake Speedway
• Chili Bowl
• Circle Lake Raceway
• Desert Rock Raceway
• Diamond Grove Raceway
• Durango Park Raceway
• Eldora Speedway
• Elm Creek Raceway
• Fairbury Speedway
• Federated Auto Parts Raceway
• Five Forks Raceway
• Grant Park Speedway
• I-19 Speedway
• Interstate 84 Raceway
• Jacobs County Speedway
• Kenyon County Fairgrounds
• Kern Raceway
• Knoxville Raceway
• Kokomo Speedway
• Lernerville Speedway
• Limaland Motorsports Park
• Lincoln Speedway
• Lucas Oil Speedway
• Madison Lake Motorsport Park
• Millbridge Speedway
• Millstone Park Speedway
• Norris County Speedway
• Old Mill Raceway
• Port Royal Speedway
• Prairie Creek Speedway
• Prairie View Speedway
• Rockberry Raceway
• Roper Mountain Raceway
• Sawtooth Mountain Speedway
• Sheep Mountain Raceway
• Sterling County Speedway
• Straight River Speedway
• Sugarbush Motor Speedway
• Texas Motor Speedway
• The Dirt Track at Charlotte
• The Dirt Track at Las Vegas Motor Speedway
• Volusia Speedway Park
• Weedsport Speedway
• Williams Grove Speedway
• Willow Creek Raceway
• Woodley Motor Speedway

Handling​

In terms of handling, World of Outlaws 24 is really really hard to keep on track, let alone go fast. These cars get sideways really easy, which is by design, of course. Most of your job is about not crashing and just holding onto the car and keep up the momentum. The main thing to think of in the dirt though, is that sliding looks cool, but is actually slow, you want to be carrying momentum and keeping the car straight as possible to get the power down to the ground.

It is hard keeping it straight though, especially on rolling starts when you are putting the power down. Often the car will go left and right and you will be banging off the walls and the other cars. My main advice for this is to just relax, and be okay with crashing a little bit. This is not iRacing, so it is okay to have a bit of biffo with the other AI drivers. There is damage in this game that will affect your car, but you really need to shunt quite hard to feel it. To get any damage I either had to hit one of the truck tires at Kokomo, or flip multiple times.

Each car drives a bit differently, with most of the entry-level cars like the Street Stock or Micro Sprint being quite forgiving. The game has natural difficulty curve as you get into faster and faster cars.

Your career starts in local dirt track competitions. Image: Monster Games

You can also customise the setup between full tight and full loose, as well as in a more detailed setup screen if you want. New this year is adjusting the wing on top of your car. You can do this mid-race, and you move the wing forwards or backwards to change the balance of your car.

It is difficult to drive in this game, but also really rewarding to get right. It takes a while to get into it, but once you do, you find yourself bashing out the same laptime over and over. I find that the trick is often holding a very slight slide and not correcting it. If you are playing on controller it is really tempting to be using lots of turn through the corner, but my advice is to actually not touch the steering at all unless you are altering the slide.

Flick the car into the corner, and let go of the left stick, only tweaking it sideways in tiny bits to adjust the slide. As soon as you start playing with it too much it gets difficult, and if you turn right for slightly too long you will overcorrect into the fence.

Wheel Handling​

There are driving aids as well available for those struggling. This game is also wheel compatible. I have not been playing it on wheel, but @Michel Wolk has – and he found it crazy difficult. Quite the contrast to the approachable but still not too easy controller approach.

Graphics​

It might just be me, but I think World of Outlaws 24 looks better than the previous game. It looks more refined, and the colours look brighter – just nicer overall in my opinion, despite some aliasing that is sometimes visible. My favourite thing in this game is the day-to-night transition over the course of a race night. Practice is usually held in the day time, the heats in the sunset and the main as the final race of the night.

It has to be said, however, that the absence of animated steering wheels in the interiro cameras is a bit puzzling. From external views, you can see your driver move their arms, but it is hard to tell whether or not the wheel actually turns.

Image: Monster Games

The HUD and menus look better than in 2023, and are easier to navigate. But it still is basically the same menus as the previous game’s, and also the previous game before that, Tony Stewart Dirt Racing. Come to think of it, actually the same as NASCAR Heat as well. The garage menus are not new at all.

Another thing that was new in last year’s DLC but that I had not seen yet are tearoffs. Your screen gets all dirty – even in external camera views – and you have a limited amount of tearoffs to clean it. It is a cool feature, but also slightly annoying to remember.

Anyone who watched my stream will know though that for some reason my brain automatically tunes out any dirt on my screen, and I always forget to bind a tearoff button in iRacing. So of course, I tend to forget to use tearoffs in this game frequently, too.

Game Modes​

A new mode this year is the Outlaw Challenge mode featuring Donny Schatz. It is nice to have a different mode to play in, but it is honestly nothing too exciting – a number of challenges set by Schatz to complete.

Career Mode is the meat of World of Outlaws 24, and I think it has really good progression. But it is also basically the same as the previous game.

You select either Midgets or Micro Sprints as your starting point and create your team. You can customise your driver, liveries, team names, branding and more before getting get stuck into the low-level local racing. The aim is to eventually make it to full national level World of Outlaws.

You can select the season length, and I recommend not choosing a full regulation season just to cut down on time. I picked the Midget, and I was a little disappointed to not see a race at the Chilli Bowl in the first series as well.

Getting Started In Career Mode​

I entered my first race and it started with an hour-long practice session followed by qualifying. Both sessions have a target lap time for you to hit, with skill points given if you get there.

After that, you get placed in a heat race. Where you place in this heat race determines where you go next. The top few drivers from each heat go to a special dash race to set the top few rows for the A Main. The next few drivers in the heat go straight to the A Main. And then everyone else goes to the B Main, the last chance qualifier – where you have a final shot to make it into the show.

Now in your first race your car is woefully inadequate. I drove around way off the pace and qualified 40th before getting knocked out straight away in the B Main. It sucked, I felt terrible.

Team, car and driver customisation are rather in-depth in World of Outlaws 24.

Car Upgrades​

Once you are back at your garage, you can upgrade your car, though – or buy new parts entirely. You also have durability of your car to deal with, meaning repairing parts is an option (or rather a necessity) as well. I upgraded my car in multiple areas before the next race at Kokomo and had a much better time racing around 30th on the grid.

The drivers included in this year’s game make appearances throughout your career, giving advice on camera. These are great, but also hilarious – no hate! It is very obvious they are reading off a script right next to the camera, but the integration of the real drivers itself is a nice touch.

The third race of my season was a showcase race at Eldora. These showcase races feature way more drivers, and an opportunity to pick up sponsors that will pay you more in the game. I bought tires before this race, and it turned out for Eldora I really should have just bought an engine as the track is rather fast.

I only got placed in the F Main as a result, but somehow fought my way through and qualified for the E Main before I got knocked out there. It was cool though – I got paid and somebody even bought a TShirt and I made $10!

We’re not going to lie, seeing the total earnings from selling merch increase with each event made us kind of proud.

As your career progresses, you can keep upgrading your car until you finally qualify for an A Main. And it is the very American, with the flag waving against the night sky, and one of a few versions of the national anthem being performed over the speakers. It actually really hypes you up, especially once you make it to the 410 sprint cars when you do a 4-wide salute and some of the most famous words in racing you wanted the best, you got them 4 abreast, and so on.

Career mode also has the option to hire staff members. Some of them will give you bonuses for repairing your car or making money. I have not gotten to it yet in World of Outlaws 24, but in the previous game you could also hire a driver to race for you.

In 23, I found Mehrab Ryley had the best balance of stats and cost. I would chuck him in my UMP Modified and get him to just run races over and over, and he owuld just print money for my race team. It is a bit like an infinite money hack. If you get the chance to do that in this game and you cannot be bothered driving, it is kind of funny to take the management part that was not intended for this mode.

Verdict​

World of Outlaws: Dirt Racing 24 is, for me, the ultimate couch racing game. Need for Speed, The Crew and Test Drive Unlimited are too open-worldy for my taste, and WRC, F1 and Assetto Corsa Competizione are a little too serious. And playing Gran Turismo 7, I get way too competitive anyway.

I love playing World of Outlaws 24 on the couch because I can completely switch off my brain off and just drive on autopilot whilst holding a conversation with someone else at the same time. It is intense enough to capture your attention, and wins mean a lot. But the races are super short and do not matter too much. Some of my favourite moments playing this game are slide jobbing four AI cars at the same time and feeding one of them a wheel into a huge Sprint Car flip into the catchfence with both myself and my partner just absolutely losing it laughing on the couch.

Outside iRacing, which simulates sprint car racing super well, World of Outlaws 24 is honestly the best speedway game available.

If you have not played one of these dirt racing games before, I highly recommend picking it up. I think it is underrated, and so fun to play for everyone – even the crowd who tends to dismiss oval racing as being too simple and easy. Even if dirt racing seems like not your thing, I think you will really like this game.

Image: Monster Games

That being said, if you picked up World of Outlaws: Dirt Racing 23, and especially if you got the DLC, I do not think that 24 is worth picking up. It is essentially the same game as before with two new tracks and two new cars, some updated liveries and an adjustable wing.

Annual releases are hard to pull off, and it is likely that everyone has an opinion on them. Monster Games has done a good job with this one – but I honestly do not know if it is worth paying full-price for it. It is the same as what I say for F1 and MotoGP every year: For some people, it may be worth splashing the money on it, and for some people it may not be. It is for you to work that out.

3.25 / 5

World of Outlaws: Dirt Racing 24 is out now on PS4, PS5, Xbox One and the Xbox Series X|S consoles.

What are your impressions of World of Outlaws: Dirt Racing 24? Let us know in the comments below and join the discussion in our forums!