In an explosive, high-speed blend of tabletop gaming, racing and shooting, the new free-to-play Warhammer 40,000 Speed Freeks arrived with an Alpha version available to download now from Steam.

A new entry into the Warhammer 40K franchise, Speed Freeks is developed by Caged Elements, who have previously created GRIP: Combat Racing. And it will let you pick from a range of Ork vehicles to compete in various modes, with up to 16 players online.

The Warhammer 40,000 universe has been popular as the basis for FPS and some strategy games in the past, but Speed Freeks offers something more familiar to fans of classic games including Twisted Metal. For a close current example, Crossout is similar in principle, also being a free-to-play vehicle combat game, but using the standard post-Apocalyptic Mad Max style setting familiar to most people. Ironically, Games Workshop has produced car-based roleplaying games in that style, including Dark Futures.

While the Alpha may be limited, it shows some promise, and the setting within Warhammer 40,000 is fun, although we’ll have to wait and see how the developers and publishers decide to monetise their free-to-play title. And it’d be nice to see other Warhammer 40K factions introduced, so you could have the different vehicles of Space Marines, Tyranids, Aeldari etc facing each other in battle.

But the Orks are a decent starting point if you can put up with endless references to dakka and Speedwaaagh! without going slightly insane. It’ll be interesting to see how it progresses towards a full release, as there are definitely some tweaks which would improve the gameplay at the moment, but the foundations of a fun game are definitely already in place.

Either way, Warhammer 40,000 Speed Freeks arrives during the Warhammer Skulls festival, with discounts on a wide range of current and older games. So if you prefer shooting or strategy, you can get your fix that way, whilst also trying out Speed Freeks for free on the PC via Steam.