Japanese Drift Master flew pretty much under the radar when it was released. A year later, it ignited a truly unique passion in Kevin .
JDM—Japanese Drift Master—doesn’t do itself any favors with its name. First, the abbreviation is already taken online by Jeffrey Dean Morgan from *The Walking Dead*, and second—and far more importantly—the name sounds a lot like one of those countless cheap racing games that were available on every bargain bin at Media Markt or Saturn back in the 2000s. Things like *Top Gear RPM Tuning* or *Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing*.
Yet behind JDM lies an incredibly ambitious project—at least for the Polish publishing and development label Gaming Factory. Their portfolio usually features… let’s call them, charitably, “niche games”: Booze Masters: Freezing Moonshine, Foodtruck Arena, Bug Academy, and a bakery simulation.
JDM, on the other hand? A graphically ambitious open-world racing game with official vehicle licenses that builds an entire Japanese prefecture from the ground up. Upon its release in May 2025, it was actually the first racing game ever to bring the dream of a Japanese open world to life—nearly 12 months before Forza Horizon 6.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t quite enough to be a massive hit. The international reviews at the time were pretty lukewarm; even in our GlobalESportNews review of JDM, my colleague Daniel gave it a meager 64 points—and rightly so, because JDM has many issues, such as the complete lack of a damage model. Nevertheless, a year later, I threw myself into the drift courses in the Japanese mountains and fell head over heels in love like I haven’t in a long time, because there simply has never been a racing game quite like this before.
There has never been a racing game like this
JDM is also a niche game in the sense that it caters to a very specific fantasy with surgical precision. While other racing games tend to take a broad-brush approach, lumping drag racing, drifting, circuit racing, rallying, and tuning all together, this game is entirely about drifting. And not just that: it’s about Japanese drifting!
The so-called “touge” racing culture has a 50-year history there, and pop culture phenomena like the anime Initial D—with its Eurobeat soundtrack—have made it famous around the world. What makes Japanese touge racing so special:
- Japan is home to countless narrow mountain passes—hairpin turns that wind their way up and down the mountains.
- Races usually focus on two drivers, who race down the mountain in a cat-and-mouse game, staying as close to each other as possible.
- There’s no room for error—no gravel traps or run-off areas. If you mess up the drift, you’ll end up right in the guardrail or against the mountainside.
- The focus is on lightly tuned, compact cars like the famous Toyota AE86, which even steal the show from sports cars here.
- Raw engine power matters less than driving skill.
And even the genre’s king, Forza Horizon 6, doesn’t pull this off quite as well. Yes, on paper it also features winding roads and drift courses, but Horizon 6’s open world is sprawling—you can constantly veer off course—and the roads have been significantly widened compared to their real-world counterparts, even in tight turns.
JDM stays true to its roots here: Every guardrail is made of indestructible titanium, and the turns remain incredibly tight—almost claustrophobic.< Under no circumstances should you buy this game if you want to tear through the countryside—the game world in JDM primarily serves as a parkour course for the most daring routes possible, where you have to drift with millimeter precision to make the turns.
Déjà-vu!
And Initial D times three: Of course, there are also plenty of Eurobeat radio stations. JDM clearly aims for the same vibe as its source material: a youth culture of hotheads who make their tires screech on ridiculously dangerous mountain passes at night. In Japan, there’s the term “Spokon,” a portmanteau of “sport” and “konjo” (determination), used to sum up this battle for the crown of a sport. Anime like Captain Tsubasa or Haikyu!! embody it, and JDM inherits it.
And if you’re into this very specific fantasy—just like me—then JDM’s gameplay strengths more than make up for its equally striking weaknesses.
Is JDM for you?
JDM is a simcade racer—another portmanteau of “simulation” and “arcade,” a rather paradoxical one at that—but in this case, it simply means: Drift Master is never a true racing sim like iRacing, yet it strives for a certain level of skill, especially when it comes to drifting.
And boy, I can really feel that level of challenge. In Forza Horizon 6, I’d have to drift every now and then, but in JDM, I have to master it. Even the very first sushi run becomes a test of patience because, after what feels like an endless straightaway, I only get a few tight turns to earn those drift points—which I’m supposed to keep the meter high on. One small mistake and I end up in the barrier.
The drift itself is easy to initiate. Either I pull the handbrake or press the clutch in the turn, depending on whether I want to slow down. The real challenge begins after that: I have to countersteer skillfully, modulate the gas pedal, and balance the car’s lean so that the drift takes me cleanly around the turn, but I can then speed off again even faster.
Especially in narrow, winding hairpin turns, where I’m constantly shifting my weight, this turns into a sweat-inducing exercise in precision. And when there’s a gas-guzzler in front of me and I have to find a way to pass it… even on the medium difficulty level, JDM demands every ounce of my driving skill.
A Tight Open World
But that’s exactly what it needs to be, because drifting is the one gimmick JDM has to offer. Sure, I earn money and points to buy new cars, tuning parts, and cosmetic upgrades, but at launch, the international press mainly criticized the lack of variety—and quite rightly so. JDM is a drifting racing game, an Initial D fantasy, and really nothing else.
At least the game received plenty of patches after release; for example, proper multiplayer was only added a few days ago, in case you want to zoom through Guntama Province as a duo. But JDM remains an incredibly unique experience for people like me who love quirky racing games with rough edges. And that’s why I wanted to recommend it to you.
