Pencil Racer 3: Drive It Walkthrough

Pencil Racer was one of the most unique and creative 'build your own track' BMX games online but Pencil Racer 3: Drive It goes above and beyond, taking the foundation laid out by the original game and expanding on it to create one of the most entertaining games in the genre. You still start out with an empty game screen and are challenged to create the most entertaining track you can create, but you have a ton of new options and a little more clarity in how the lines work. In the third installment in the series, you have color coded floors and ceilings to make things a little easier to understand, making the game far more accessible to a wider audience. This one isn't as complicated as the first game, but it will still take a little (or a lot) of getting used to.

If you haven't played the original Pencil Racer game or aren't familiar with 'build your own track' BMX games, I would recommend going through the tutorial Pencil Racer 3: Drive It offers. It will help you understand how to go about drawing lines and will outline some important points you need to keep in mind when you're building your track. Likely the most important thing you'll pick up from the tutorial is the difference between 'floors' and 'ceilings'. Those familiar with the original game will also be vaguely familiar with this concept although they weren't referred to as floors and ceilings in the first game. Basically, you can drive on floors but you cannot drive on ceilings. Pretty obvious stuff, really. While the concept is nothing new, the way it is presented in this game definitely is. By adding color coding (the bottom of the track is indicated by a red line) helps make everything a bit easier to keep track of. You can see just at a glance what piece of track is a floor and what piece of track is a ceiling. Floors will have the red line on the bottom while ceilings will have the red line on the top. Your vehicle will drive along floors with no problem, but will fall through ceilings. Keep this in mind as you build your track. To draw a floor you'll move your mouse from the left to the right. To draw a ceiling, move your mouse from the right to the left. It sounds far more complicated than it actually is. Once you've played for a while, you'll get the hang of the floor/ceiling situation and be able to use the two different types of track to your advantage.

The basic premise behind Pencil Racer 3: Drive It is the same as the basic premise that most of the other 'build your own track' BMX games are based on. You are challenged to design the track you would want to race on using your mouse and the tools you're provided with. In a lot of ways, this game is quite similar to the original Pencil Racer, but there are a few key differences - the most obvious being the layout of the game screen. Instead of having an option panel at the bottom of the screen with different palettes to choose tools from, your tool palette is shown on the upper left corner of the screen and lies down along the side. This is a big improvement over the bulkier design in the original game. If gives you more screen to design your track on without having to zoom out or drag your map. For drawing your track, you'll be using the tools on the default tool palette. You only again have the pencil tool and the line tool which give you quite a big of freedom to be creative with the actual track design. The pencil tool allows you to draw free form lines while the line tool allows you to draw straight lines. The options don't end there though.

Stickiness and acceleration are back again in Pencil Racer 3: Drive It and it's a good thing they are. This is one of the features of the game that really sets it apart from most of the other 'build your own track' BMX games online. Instead of simply giving you the ability to draw lines, this one also allows you to use the lines to impact the way your vehicle moves over certain stretches of track. 'Sticky' lines will make your vehicle move slower while 'Accelerated' lines will make your vehicle move quicker. This definitely comes in handy if you are looking to create a more complicated track. You increase the stickiness or acceleration of track lines by using the slider bars at the bottom of the screen. Accelerated lines are great for building speed before heading up a hill or before jumping off a ramp. More speed off a ramp means more height. Sticky lines are great anywhere you need to go a bit slower. If you're really looking to boost the difficulty level of your track, try slightly increasing the stickiness on hills. That will definitely make things much harder.

Pencil Racer 3: Drive It also offers 'Art' mode as the first game did and once again, this is a feature that really sets this game apart from many of the other games in the genre. You have basically the same options in 'Art' mode as you had in the first game so anyone familiar with the original should have little trouble getting the hang of the 'art' mode in this one. 'Art' mode works basically the same way as 'Track' mode, but anything you draw in 'Art' mode will not have an impact on how your vehicle moves. 'Art' mode is all about decoration and making your track more visually appealing. This option is great because it really allows you to let your imagination run wild. You can draw elaborate backdrops or keep things a little more simple. Regardless of what you choose to do, you have the tools at your disposal to make it happen. You can chance the color and thickness of your lines in 'Art' mode as well as changing the background color of the entire screen. The color palette in this game is actually fairly impressive. You can change the lines and the background to just about any color you can imagine. Very nice feature of the game.

What really sets Pencil Racer 3: Drive It apart from not only the other 'build your own track' BMX games online but also the previous games in this series, is the addition of several different items you can add during the design stage of the game and try to collect during playback. Some of the items can even be scaled to fit in better with your track or rotated depending on how you want them to appear. The items you can add basically fall into three categories; interactive items (goals, power ups and hazards), pre-built track pieces and art shapes. Interactive items can be placed throughout your track to provide you with a little extra challenge. If you reach the finish line and collect all of the items, you win. If you fail to clear one of the hazards, you need to try again. You can move these items in the designer once you've placed them, so if hazard is really giving you a hard time, look at where it is placed. Sometimes, it's simply a matter or moving it slightly. You may also want to consider making the track before the hazard either sticky or accelerated depending on the type of hazard. Pre-built track pieces can be used as part of the track. Your vehicle will interact with these track pieces the same way it would interact with the piece had you drawn it yourself. Art pieces, on the other hand, are there merely for decoration. They won't have any effect on how your vehicle moves over the track, but they're a nice addition; allowing for a more unique and individualized track.

once you have your track designed in Pencil Racer 3: Drive It, it's time to take it out for a test drive. There are several different vehicles to choose from; each one handling a little differently and offering its own strengths and weaknesses. The best way to figure out which one you like the best is to try them all out. After choosing your vehicle, it's time to start driving on the track. Here is where the biggest difference between this game and the original game comes into play. You actually control your vehicle in this one. You accelerate, brake, balance and even change directions. This allows the game to more closely resemble a BMX game instead of feeling like more of a physics or drawing game. This makes the game far more appealing to seasoned BMX game fans. You have complete control over how difficult the track is and can make it look however you want it to look. At the same time, you're still sticking to the genre you know and love. Newcomers to the genre are likely going to have a bit of trouble keeping their vehicle under control, but really, it all comes down to balance. Make sure you tilt your vehicle when you need to; especially over steep or complicated obstacles. Balance is everything. If you take off over a ramp and get a decent amount of air look at where you expect to land. Position yourself in the air to be ready for the landing. Otherwise, there's a pretty good chance you'll crash.