Exo Rally Championship can seem a bit intimidating for new players not familiarized with its off-road racing, but once you get past the basics, it can be smooth sailing, and out guide has everything you need to know about Exo Rally Championship gameplay.
At first glance, Exo Rally Championship looks like a racing game you’d see in the early 2000s, but once you spend a few hours with the game, you’d start to notice just how advanced this off-road racing game really is. When you boot up Exo Rally Championship for the first time, you’ll play as a new driver for Lindsay, an old racing team that’s seen better days.
The storyline here is simple, but game mechanics can be confusing for new players. Our Exo Rally guide is here to help.
How to get started with Exo Rally Championship
Before jumping into Series mode, run through the training tutorials. The game’s developer overhauled the tutorials to make the flow faster and the introduction more friendly to new players, and you’ll need to complete the relevant training to unlock your Race License for each class.
All players will need to start with UTV training to earn the Amateur license. This license allows you to explore other game modes like free roam, series, events, online rally. The Series mode locks you into procedurally generated stages, but the Events mode lets you practice the same stages, and Free Roam is a low-pressure way to learn how the UTV behaves.
If you want to play with friends, the Online Rally mode lets you create your own series and have other players compete asynchronously. No shared start time required.
How to control the UTV in Exo Rally Championship
Exo Rally Championship keeps pushing the goal post further with its license system. That means you can’t move onto Exo4 before you have fully mastered the UTV by completing all stages and time trials.
The good news is that handling UTV is relatively simple, and this a simple controls rundown for those new to off-road racing should help further:
- A and D: Steering
- W: Accelerate
- S: Brake
- Spacebar: Handbrake
- Arrow keys: RCS thrusters. Press the left, right, above, and below keys to balance the car if it flips over.
- Q: Reverse
- E: Switch back to accelerate
For players on PC, UTV’s reverse works differently than in other racing games. Instead of simply pressing S or back key, Exo Rally has assigned reverse to Q. When you press Q, the W accelerate key can be used to drive backwards. To switch back to drive, press E.
UTV is the simplest of all vehicles, but players must keep two other things in mind while driving:
- Thruster fuel is finite, and so is heat capacity. RCS thrusters glow when they reach critical heat, and overheating can melt, rotate, block, or destroy them.
- The UTV doesn’t drift much. With 4WD and the lower power figure, it’s more about clean lines and patience than aggressive cornering. The higher classes are where the rear-biased trophy-truck feel kicks in.
A common new-player mistake: the rover can drive much faster than you’re supposed to drive it. Top speed is a trap. Match your speed to the terrain ahead, and use the drone survey to identify where it’s safe to push.
What are all the licenses in Exo Rally Championship?
Licenses in Exo Rally Championship are tied to the rover classes. Each license requires completing the relevant training before you’re allowed to compete in that class’s Series cups. There are four classes in the game at launch:
- UTV License
- Exo4 License
- Exo6 License
- Miner License
The UTV is a 1000kg, 250HP, front-biased 4WD with no fuel weight to worry about. This is what you’ll race in the Aspire Rally Cup, the entry-level championship. Exo4 License is the game’s semi-pro tier. Stepping up to the Exo4 is a noticeable jump in difficulty, the tutorial alone can feel like sensory overload as you learn what the thrusters can do.
The top-tier rally license is achieved by unlocking Exo6, which is a 1500kg, 1200HP, no-costs-spared 6WD exoplanetary rally rover with full-axis RCS thrusters. This is the class fighting for the actual Exo Rally Championship title.
Finally, players earn specialist licenses by unlocking the Miner. Mining rovers demand a completely different driving style because you have no air control at all to bail you out of mistakes.
To unlock each license, you complete the corresponding training program in-game. There was previously a bug that let players complete training without actually receiving the Race License, but that has since been patched out. It’s still worth confirming that a license is granted before you queue into a championship.
