Asphalt Retro
Gameloft’s pixel-art Asphalt Urban GT in the browser: eight city tracks, five boosts a race, drifts on a double-tap and three laps against seven rivals.
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What is Asphalt Retro?
Asphalt Retro is a free pixel-art street racing game from Gameloft: three-lap races against seven rivals on eight tracks around the world, with a stock of boosts for each race and drifts on a double-tap. The game’s own title screen calls it Asphalt Urban GT, and its About page reads “Asphalt UrbanGT ver.1.0.0 © 2004-2020 Gameloft” — this is the classic phone game, and its help screens still mention the phone’s “right soft key”.
It looks the part. The screen is tall and narrow, like the phones the original was made for; the menus are blocky pixel text; and the opening screen asks you to pick a language — Deutsch, English, Español, Français or Italiano — before an Accept button. The menus answer the keyboard rather than the mouse: arrow keys move the highlight and Enter selects.
The main menu offers Instant Play, Arcade, Options, Help and About. Instant Play throws you straight into a race; in ours, the first was called “Urban Havoc” and a second, in a different car, ran through Paris with the Eiffel Tower on the skyline. Arcade opens a Race selection screen where you choose the track yourself.
Arcade lists eight tracks, each with its length, lanes and traffic: New York, U.S.A. (2,700 m, 4 lanes, light traffic); Paris, France (3,100 m, 4 lanes, average); London, UK (2,915 m, 3 lanes, heavy); Sicily, Italy (2,432 m, 2 lanes, light); Luxor, Egypt (3,025 m, 2 lanes, light); Vladivostok, Russia (3,156 m, 2 lanes, light); the CA desert, U.S.A. (4,066 m, 2 lanes, light); and Tokyo, Japan (2,512 m, 4 lanes, heavy).
The race screen shows your position (8th of 8 on the grid), a row of five stars, your money, the lap (1 of 3), five lightning bolts and your speed in km/h. The bolts are your boosts: each press of the Up arrow fires one, and we watched the row drop from five to four after a single boost.
A race begins under a chequered banner with a countdown in giant pixel digits, and your car is last on the grid. Pressing Esc mid-race opens a pause menu with Resume, Restart, a Sound setting and Exit to menu. Back on the main menu, Help steps through the controls one screen at a time, and About shows the version and Gameloft’s copyright notice.
Instant Play is the quickest way in, but Arcade is where you learn the game: the track card tells you what you are getting into before you start. The four-lane tracks — New York, Paris and Tokyo — leave room to pass even in traffic; the two-lane roads through Sicily, Luxor, Vladivostok and the CA desert do not, though all four are marked as light traffic.
GameDistribution lists Asphalt Retro under Gameloft SE and published it on February 13, 2023. Its description promises “8 amazing tracks, using 8 cars more powerful than one another!” and warns you to “avoid getting busted along the way”.
Playing Asphalt Retro
- 1Pick a language
Press Play, choose a language with the arrow keys and press Enter to accept.
- 2Choose Instant Play or Arcade
Instant Play starts a race at once. Arcade lets you choose the track from a list of eight.
- 3Steer and brake
The in-game help: “Press the Left or Right arrow to steer” and “Press the Down arrow to brake.”
- 4Boost
“Press the Up arrow to activate a boost.” You get five per race, shown as lightning bolts at the bottom of the screen.
- 5Drift
“Double-press the Left or Right arrow to drift.” Use it to carry speed through bends.
- 6Finish three laps
Races are three laps against seven rivals. Your position and lap count sit at the top of the screen.
Asphalt Retro controls
| Input | Action |
|---|---|
| Up arrow | Boost |
| Left / Right arrows | Steer |
| Left / Right, double-press | Drift |
| Down arrow | Brake |
| Esc | Pause |
| Arrow keys + Enter | Move through and select menu items |
Modes & progression
Jumps straight into a race. Ours put us in different cars on different tracks each time.
Choose from eight tracks, each listed with its length, number of lanes and traffic level.
Resume, Restart, Sound (we saw Medium and Loud) and Exit to menu.
How to win at Asphalt Retro
Ration the bolts. Asphalt Retro gives you five boosts per race, shown as lightning bolts. A three-lap race is long, so spread them out instead of firing them all off the line.
Boost on the straights. A boost is wasted if you have to brake straight after it. Save the Up arrow for long, clear stretches and use drifts to keep speed in the bends.
Practise the double-tap. Drifting is a double-press of Left or Right. It is easy to steer once by accident instead, so practise it on an easy track first.
Pick quiet tracks to learn. Arcade shows each track’s traffic. Sicily, Luxor, Vladivostok, the CA desert and New York are marked Light; London and Tokyo are Heavy. Learn the game where the roads are clear.
Mind the lane count. Two-lane tracks such as Sicily and Luxor leave little room to pass. Four-lane tracks — New York, Paris and Tokyo — make overtaking easier even when traffic is heavy.
Use the keyboard in the menus. Like the phone game it came from, Asphalt Retro’s menus answer the arrow keys and Enter. In the pause menu the highlight wraps around, so pressing Up from Resume jumps straight to Exit to menu.
Good to know — Asphalt Retro’s longest track is the CA desert at 4,066 m; its shortest is Sicily at 2,432 m — both two-lane roads with light traffic.
What makes Asphalt Retro fun
- Gameloft’s classic Asphalt Urban GT, in pixel art
- Eight tracks across seven countries
- Three-lap races against seven rivals
- Five boosts per race, shown as lightning bolts
- Double-tap drifting
- Instant Play and Arcade track selection
- Five languages
- Free in the browser, with no download and no signup
Why play Asphalt Retro on PlayFutbol?
Asphalt Retro runs free and instantly in your browser here — no download, no signup, on phone or desktop. And when you want to test your football brain rather than your reflexes, it sits alongside 48 original daily football trivia games made by PlayFutbol.
Explore PlayFutbol's daily gamesFrequently asked questions
Pick Instant Play or a track in Arcade, then race three laps against seven rivals. Steer with Left and Right, brake with Down, boost with Up and double-press Left or Right to drift.
Yes. The game’s title screen reads Asphalt Urban GT, and its About page says “Asphalt UrbanGT ver.1.0.0 © 2004-2020 Gameloft”. GameDistribution lists it as Asphalt Retro.
From the in-game help: Up to boost, Left or Right to steer, Down to brake, a double-press of Left or Right to drift, and the right soft key or Esc to pause. GameDistribution’s instructions put it as “Use the top arrow to boost your engine. Double tap left or right arrows to drift.”
Eight: New York, Paris, London, Sicily, Luxor, Vladivostok, the CA desert and Tokyo. Arcade lists each with its length, lanes and traffic.
Five per race, shown as lightning bolts at the bottom of the screen. Each press of the Up arrow uses one.
The menus come from a phone game and answer the keyboard: move with the arrow keys and press Enter to select. In our testing, clicking the Accept button did nothing.
Press Esc. The pause menu offers Resume, Restart, Sound and Exit to menu; use the arrow keys to choose and Enter to confirm.
Five, chosen on the first screen: Deutsch, English, Español, Français and Italiano.
GameDistribution’s description warns you to “avoid getting busted along the way”. We did not meet the police in our short races.
Yes — the pause menu has a Sound setting; we saw it at Medium and at Loud.
The CA desert, at 4,066 m. The shortest is Sicily, at 2,432 m. Arcade shows the length of every track before you race it.
GameDistribution’s description promises eight cars. In Instant Play we raced in a different car each time.
Gameloft. The About page credits the game and the Asphalt: Urban GT trademark to Gameloft, and GameDistribution lists it under Gameloft SE.
Yes. Asphalt Retro runs free in your browser on PlayFutbol, with no download and no account.
Asphalt Retro is a third-party HTML5 game served via GameDistribution and embedded here for free play. PlayFutbol's own 48 daily football trivia games are first-party.