Cars
All vehicles move by using one stick to steer and the other to look around, and they all use the triggers to accelerate and brake/reverse. Cars can jump and, as you might guess, the faster it goes the farther it jumps—this is especially true when you hit a ramp. This is where two important features come in: drifting and turbo.
Drifting
Drifting is the process of holding both triggers while driving into a turn or even a circle. This maneuver is great for getting around corners when you are at top speeds, but more importantly it builds up the turbo meter. More turbo means more speed. Drift in any race or situation where you need to store up that potential boost.
Turbo
There is a meter under your vehicle that indicates how many bars of turbo you have. When you do a stunt or drift, the meter in one bar will fill until it is yellow, which means you can activate that boost. After one bar is yellow, the next gauge will start to fill and continue the process. Once all segments of the meter are yellow, you are wasting an effort to build turbo and should use a boost as soon as possible. To activate the turbo is a simple flick of the control stick and your vehicle will shoot flames showing you are boosting. Obviously it can be dangerous to boost at a turn, but a drift can help control that speed. A turbo assist is great any time you are in a straightaway, a close race to the finish, or when you want to hit a ramp at top speed to maximize your air time for stunts or tricks.
Stunts/Tricks
Probably the coolest thing about cars, besides high-speed driving, is the tricks you can pull off. After leaping in the air, pushing the right stick up, down, left, or right will trigger front or back flips, spins, or barrel rolls. Doing two of the same motions while in the air is considered a double trick. However, if you push in two different directions, the stunt is considered a combo and earns even more points. If you get enough height and speed, it is possible to pull off a triple combo for really big points. The key to chaining moves is to immediately flip the control stick when you are airborne and quickly press another direction as that move completes to perform the next trick.
Bikes
Two wheelers can perform stunts and tricks similar to cars, but they don’t have a turbo gauge. Generally bikes are pretty slow, but to get a boost you need to do a trick that gives the bike a blue trail as it speeds along. This speed trail shows that the bike is going at top speed and it is the perfect time for hitting ramps to get big air and do tricks. A cool feature of bikes is that they can grind on rails and even build up a blue speed burst while doing so. One down side to bikes is that they are somewhat fragile. If you don’t land well after even a short jump, that bike will break apart and you have to wait for it to reform.
Mounts
There are several unique animals to ride in the Play Sets, mostly in Lone Ranger. You can expect to find a bunch of horses, an elephant, and other critters in the Play Sets and Toy Box. Horses can run (accelerate) and turn, as they stand on their back legs and neigh, but they don’t do stunts. However, unlike other rides, you can shoot while on horseback. That speed while shooting is a big advantage. As you might guess, an elephant doesn’t run, but it can stomp and charge. Animal companions may not be as fast as other forms of transportation, but they are very fun to ride around and bring a lot of variety traveling throughout the worlds.
Ships
Found in the Pirates Play Set, ships are essential to the pirate theme and come in two types. There is a small dinghy, which is a tiny boat, but it still packs a cannon that can wipe out enemies and remove debris. The big ship is where you really get to act as a captain to customize, steer, and battle your boat on the open seas, however. Visually the ship can be customized like many buildings or NPCs, but the exciting part is changing the type of cannons it can fire and the type of power-ups it uses. These options make your ship the terror of the seas to anyone foolish enough to cross your path. It is literally a blast to sink other ships, especially when you can change views to see things from another angle and manually fire the final cannon to send them to the locker.
Flight
A few special methods allow a player to fly through the world, and some even come with weapons. It is pretty thrilling to fly over an entire map, but remember that these are not fighting jets and most modes of air travel are not very fast. These vehicles move in a similar way to others, but there is the added element of controlling elevation by going higher and lower.
Unique
There are many other modes of transportation that are unique to each Play Set and can appear in the Toy Box, such as the Hover Board and Glide Pack. Their special functionality determines how they are controlled and what they can do. These add a new experience in game play and can take a while to master.