Racing fiends, I come here for your advice. I'm looking for a simple SP racing game I can play with either keyboard or gamepad, with long and varied tracks that takes time to master. To be more precise, I'm a big fan of Getting Over It with Bennett Foddy, Quake 3 Defrag, this kind of games that can be replayed ad vitam aeternam simply for the pleasure of slowly getting better at them. Good music is appreciated, nice visuals are a must although I don't need last-gen details and am perfectly happy with quality retro style. Most importantly the controls must be perfect. I don't care for careers or unlockable. Only long tracks, precise driving, and never-ending challenge. Does it ring a bell to you ?
It doesn't check all the boxes, especially because long tracks are not that common (the game is all about user tracks and you can filter by length in the semi-official track registry, it just isn't where most of the focus is), but in my opinion there's no better arcade racing game that you can play for years purely for the fun of getting better at it than Trackmania.
The controls are pretty much perfect and the physics model is the deepest I've ever seen in an arcade game that's not trying to be realistic but to create its own complex non-realistic system. It takes years to master and it's all about precision. The core of the game is the physics plus the fact that it comes with a fully featured track editor (meaning there's no difference between "official tracks" and user tracks), so you continually get new tracks, many of which are of pretty high quality.
The base version where you can try out if you like the physics and graphics is free, you get 25 new tracks every 3 months, but this seasonal official campaign has sadly been getting simpler and simpler (not necessarily the medal times, but the concepts used in the tracks) to retain more new users. The paid version uses a subscription model, but it's just 10 USD per year, which to me is a pretty good deal considering they do keep adding not just maps but also new features.
This is an example of what a mainstream style "long" trackmania map looks like. Longer maps are uncommon because they tend to be frustrating due to how much concentration is needed to not fuck up for 10 minutes straight. However there are some weirdos who spent hundreds of hours to get the world record on a super difficult 10 minutes long map.
