Cyber Clutch: Hot Import Nights

Written by Jason Dailey on 8/8/2025 for PS5  

I enjoy cyberpunk-themed games, and I enjoy combat racing games, so it surprised me a bit when I did not enjoy Cyber Clutch: Hot Import Nights and its cyberpunk combat racing as much as I expected to. It’s a fine game – emphasis on fine – in the sense that it doesn’t get anything terribly wrong, but it feels a bit hollow and doesn’t do enough to keep you coming back for more.

The premise is simple in Cyber Clutch: pick one of several cars to race with, hit the track, and try to finish in first place by blowing past your opponents, which often includes blowing them up along the way. You can play in a single-player Grand Circuit mode that includes five cup vents, quick race mode, or online multiplayer races. Each cup in Grand Circuit includes three races each, with points awarded depending on how you finish in each race. To unlock the next cup event, you are required to win the previous one, and it’s not always as easy as you might think.

It took me multiple tries on most cup events to win the whole thing, but the loss wasn’t always on me. Occasionally, I would slam into invisible objects on the track, particularly after jumping ramps, which sometimes happened just before the finish line and cost me the race. And with no ability to re-play individual races, losing means you must play the entire cup event again if you don’t succeed the first time. It’s not a huge time commitment, and I had no problem doing so when I lost fair and square, but cheap glitches lead to cheap losses in a game like Cyber Clutch.

Looking past the occasional bug, the racing did not impress me all that much. If you are leading a race, especially if you’re enjoying a lengthy lead, it is particularly boring. What you would expect to be in a combat racer is here for the most part, but it rarely thrills and often feels cut-and-paste. Heck, there’s barely even any controller vibration or haptic feedback to speak of, adding to my lack of immersion that I couldn’t seem to shake. It’s a combat racer, and honestly, you’ve probably played one before that does what Cyber Clutch does, but better. Again, it’s not bad, it’s just unremarkable. You speed down the track, you pick up weapons and abilities by driving over them, and you shoot projectiles at opponents. Sound familiar? It just doesn’t bring anything new or innovative to the table to help it make a name for itself.

Once you finish the Grand Circuit mode, you unlock Expert Grand Circuit, which is the same series of events, only more difficult. You can also take part in online races for up to eight players, but I haven’t had much luck finding online matches, so don’t have much more to say in that regard other than it doesn’t look like there is much of a playerbase right now. Cyber Clutch is also a bit light on content, though it is only selling for $14.99 at the time of this writing, which is about right as a value proposition.

If Cyber Clutch tries to differentiate itself in any way, it is with its class system, which includes light, medium, and heavy class vehicles. Each class has varying stats for handling, top speed, health, and so on. Additionally, each individual car has two unique abilities or weapons, such as traps that slowly damage opponents, or homing rockets, but none of the abilities are memorable or essential.

In fact, there were a few races where I never even used an ability and still won, if that tells you anything. These recharge during a race after each use and are in addition to the abilities you can pick up on the track. These track abilities are what you typically see in a combat or kart racer – shields, speed boosts, mines, health, etc.

While the gameplay didn’t keep me engaged, I did enjoy the electronic soundtrack quite a bit, with its cyberpunk inspirations and thumping beats. I also dug most of the track environments and layouts, but the racing itself kind of negates their impact. I also want to give Cyber Clutch some flowers for an extensive vehicle customization suite that lets you give each vehicle your own personal flare from a visual standpoint by using coins earned from races to purchase new cosmetic items.

So, is a deep customization feature and a cool soundtrack enough to prop up Cyber Clutch: Hot Import Nights? Unfortunately, no. I simply can’t imagine the gameplay keeping you entertained for more than a few races, especially when there are games out there that do combat racing better in every way. Feel free to speed on past this one.