I've slowly seen more and more you tubers talking about and singing the praises of the first cars game and that makes me really happy to see, however one aspect of these games that I feel like I haven't seen discussed is how much of a fantastic and natural job that game and it's sequels do at expanding upon the world building of the first movie.
Okay so first of all I wanna mention that in the first movie, in front of mater's junkyard, there's two buildings that are in extremely rough shape
in the first movie, the space that these buildings occupy aren't really relevant to at all aside from them giving lightning mcqueen is first impression of radiator springs, well, at least in a way where he can actually process where he is. Now then, fast forward to the very end of the first movie, lightning mentions that he's getting his own racing headquarters.
now take a look at this screenshot from the first video game, notice the sign mentioning a racing quarters for lightning in front of the abandoned buildings? if you look closely, it mentions "coming soon"
In the sequel to this game, Cars mater-national, that exact space of land where those buildings reside are replaced with lightning's racing headquarters, which it's own construction progesses as you progress through the game alongside lightning's own hometrack and it's all wonderful to see both of these landmarks slowly develop in the game
In cars race o rama, none of this expanded world building has been forgotten about, lightning mcqueen's new headquarters is still a part of radiator springs while not plot relevant at all, it is still nice to see it there mean while lightning's new home track, now actually having the name of radiator springs speedway, which isn't only a place that you can race in, but is also it's own hub world that you can explore which absolutely blew my mind as kid, also the track is also more developed than it was in mater-national, and has a drastically different layout for some reason but idk it's not a really big deal, especially because of how cool this track looks
Another thing I find interesting is that race o rama establishses the hudson racing acedemy, a racing a acedemy where young, future race cars can train alongside lightning mqueen which is a very interesting direction for his character, especially considering the mentor figure that lightning would later become in cars 3, Race O rama basically beat that movie to the punch with that concept and I find that very interesting
Like oh my god, I just love how much these games expanded upon the world building from the first movie so much in such a natural and interesting way, like I can't think of that many other licensed games that even do that and I feel like this aspect of these games should be discussed more often cause it's just so fascinating, like the video games practically serve as a great continuation from the first movie, especially with the first game already taking the interesting angle of taking place after the events of the first movie and then the other two games continuing after that first game. It's just one of those aspects of these first 3 cars games that I believe makes them so much more fascinating and special compared to the cars 2 and 3 game, which I don't have anything against, since I did really like the cars 2 game back then and I haven't played driven to win, despite some of the flaws and criticisms i've heard from that game I still feel like I'll still really enjoy it since it has the same gameplay style as the cars 2 game. I also do like how that game also takes place after the third movie but I cannot speak for how well it expands upon the concepts presented in it's movie as I have never played it but I find it very sweet that the tutorial race has lightning doing a simulated race with doc even if it's present kinda weirdly cause of the dialogue/voice acting in that game is really strange. But it's fine honestly, I kinda don't really mind that those games deviate so hard from the first 3 cars games. however I cannot deny that little egg me found it odd when the second movie and it's game had not a single appearance of any of these things that were established in the games, however that didn't stop little egg me from making both the first movie, games, and second movie all be canon in my cars diecast lore.
