Shadeburn Racer

What it is

Shadeburn Racer is a Mac racing game by G. Pletnev (itch.io account CountShadow) with one rule: reach the line first, or be the last car still running. Each race builds a new track from a seed, including ovals, figure eights and two-level circuits, and cars take damage: doors, bonnets and glass break off, and a damaged engine or bent axle changes the handling. There are 8-car circuit races and 6-car demolition derbies, plus a championship and an upgrade garage, with up to 8 players over a local network; online play is listed as coming later. The author says there is no game engine inside: it is written in Free Pascal and draws directly with Metal, the cars, tracks, towns, font and music are made by code, and the whole download is about 9MB. The credits read "with AI team" and the page tags AI-assisted code, without naming the AI used. What sets it apart is packing a full racing game into roughly 9MB with code alone and no engine.

Who it's for: Apple Silicon Mac owners who enjoy crashes and car upgrades, and developers curious about what's possible without an engine.

Before you start: paid, with the price listed on itch.io, installed from a DMG. It needs an Apple Silicon Mac (M1 or newer) on macOS 13 or later; Intel Macs aren't supported. It plays with keyboard or controller, and local multiplayer triggers macOS's local network permission. Some engine, tyre and impact sounds are CC0 and CC BY 3.0 recordings from OpenGameArt, so not everything is generated by code. The game involves car crashes and wrecking.

Based on the author's itch.io page. Not tested by AI Inspiration World.