Drag x Drive is more drag than drive

When Nintendo announced Drag x Drive, a Joy-Con mouse-controlled wheelchair sports game, for the Switch 2 I was tentatively excited. I have a lot of time for developers trying new things, and sports video games are hardly replete with disability representation. Having been hands-on with the game, however, Drag x Drive has left me baffled and in significant pain.

As a “driver” — wheeled robots that come in three mostly indistinct flavors: guard, center, and forward — Drag x Drive has you play pickup games of three-on-three wheelchair basketball. You navigate the game by pushing and pulling your Joy-Cons across a surface in a motion vaguely similar to moving a wheelchair. This with a combination of shoulder button inputs and motion controls lets you move, brake, pass, and shoot.

Those basic controls are initially intuitive. This includes a satisfying controller rumble if you’re moving, and that’s a big if. My Drag x Drive experience revolved around desperately trying to get the Joy-Cons to register consistently across tables, floors, my bed, and my body. Yet, more often than not, I’d be spinning out and losing control while taking umpteen unintended captures — the home button blessedly appears to be disabled while moving the mouse. My driver regularly took both hands off its wheels unbidden in a comical, yet appropriate, shrug.

The game’s 20-minute tutorial tells you to move and then lift the Joy-Cons and to do so in long motions on a flat surface or on your legs. Yet, these actions on their suggested surfaces only contribute to an unresponsiveness that makes controlling Drag x Drive laborious. Any imperfection, be it an uneven table or folds in your clothing, has a significant impact on whether your movements translate appropriately onscreen.

I found some consistency by sitting cross-legged on my bed, hunched over, using small movements on my bedsheets (and weeping for my 34-year-old back). My legs, too, though error-strewn, were more responsive and quieter than any table I tried. This was especially true — before anyone questions my dedication in finding some way to enjoy this game — when I shaved my upper-legs and used the Joy-Cons on my bare thighs. I can’t tell whether the mouse sensors are too sensitive or not sensitive enough, but it does appear that a soft, malleable, and smooth surface yields the best, if still often frustrating, results.

If you can get moving, matches are slow and repetitive. Playing bots, loading into the three-minute games took about two minutes, and that wait can be longer online in the hub “Parks,” where you are often forced to wait for other games to finish. The loop of matches is mostly one player wheeling the ball up the court, shooting, and then the opposing team doing the same. Tackling can only be achieved head-on and, with controls that are inconsistent in their responsiveness, intentionally stealing the ball is a major achievement. Similarly, consistent shooting requires being lined up with the basket which is hard at speed, so dunking by riding up the court’s curved edges — something you’ll be doing a lot accidentally anyway — is the best tactic. Some of this sluggishness could be allayed if the games remained chaotic, but after each basket it is impossible to interact with the ball for a few seconds, meaning a delay before play can start again.

But Drag x Drive isn’t just an onscreen experience, it’s a physical one. This was always going to be an issue for disabled players, but I remain surprised how uncomfortable Drag x Drive is to play — turtling over my bedsheets for grip notwithstanding. I found the narrow claw needed to hold the Joy-Cons in this configuration agonising and lengthy play impossible.

Controller support is absent. Though, using the Joy-Con as a traditional mouse to navigate menus isn’t so bad (you can also toggle menu movements to the joystick, thankfully). Nor does it appear any additional support, even for the Hori Flex adaptive controller, is planned. Nintendo tells noti.group, “We wanted to focus on the innovative experience of using the Joy-Con 2 mouse and motion controls for this game. However, certain accessibility features can be found and utilized at the hardware system level.”

What features Nintendo references here, I cannot tell. After Mario Kart World’s reliance on — an initially impressive — system-level accessibility, it’s a concerning trend that Nintendo directs players to system menus rather than implementing mitigations into games. Though, perhaps it’s something we might have seen coming. Despite the obvious conception of these characters, Nintendo has appeared reluctant to acknowledge the disability inspiration behind the game leading up to the its official release, reportedly instructing staff to use the term “vehicles” when attendees said “wheelchairs” at hands-on events to the confusion of many. After several inquiries, Nintendo ultimately tells noti.group, “It has always been the case that the vehicles were inspired by wheelchairs. This was miscommunicated at some events. The gameplay is inspired by a mix of wheelchair basketball, wheelchair rugby, wheelchair motocross, and skateboarding.” It’s notable, however, that the only in-game references to the player characters are the terms “driver” and, on one occasion in the lengthy tutorial, “ballers.”

That said, I could not find anything that might help how frustrating and physically uncomfortable Drag x Drive’s control setup rapidly becomes.

That’s not to say there are no accessibility considerations in the game. Drag x Drive is visually easy to parse, with opposition players highlighted prominently and indicators for what’s happening offscreen being bright and bold. Nor is it entirely joyless. The controls for shooting, a satisfying and responsive flick of the wrist, are a blast when a shot lands. Though, the crispness of the game’s motion controls do further highlight the mouse controls’ deficiencies. Similarly, Rebound Scramble, one of two minigames that breaks up match play, is fleetingly fun as a madcap dash to catch a bouncing ball, though this too soon gets old. The other minigame, an obstacle course, was nothing but infuriating for me.

I could see Drag x Drive being a somewhat diverting Rocket League clone if it wasn’t stubbornly attached to Nintendo’s gimmicky, throwback to the Wii attitude to controls or simply a frustrating part of a broader suite of sports a la boxing in Wii Sports. But with sluggish, repetitive matches, two minigames, and a few activities in parks to win mostly useless rewards, it’s hard not to notice just how little Drag x Drive has to offer.

If I can say one good thing about Drag x Drive: it does demonstrate that a game based on wheelchair sports could be great in the right hands. But if you’re hoping for a fast-paced, representative, or even fun foray into wheelchair basketball, this isn’t it.