Yes. Turbo Karts is free to play in your browser on ArcadeWhale, with no download, no sign-up and no payment. Open the page, pick a race and you are on the grid.

Yes, up to four drivers race live in the same room. Choose Create Room and you are given a four-letter code to share; anyone who enters that code joins your grid. Quick Race drops you into any open room instead, and any empty slots are filled by AI karts so you never wait for a full lobby.

Because the interesting decision in a kart race is where to brake, not whether to hold a button. Removing the throttle leaves one clear question per corner and keeps the controls to two steering pads on a phone, which is what makes the game play the same on a touchscreen as on a keyboard.

Yes, and it is the main skill in the game. Slowing down tightens the arc your kart can turn through, so the two hairpins on the circuit are physically impossible at top speed and comfortable once you have shed roughly a quarter of your speed. Braking is not just about avoiding an overshoot; it changes what line is available to you.

You lose more than half your top speed for as long as you are off the asphalt, and you carry that loss into the next straight. Cutting a corner almost never pays, which is what makes the racing line worth learning and the kerbs worth using.

They sit in fixed rows across the track, so you always know where the next one is and can decide whether the line to reach it is worth the distance. You hold what you pick up until you press Space or the round button, so timing is part of it. There are three items: a boost, a rocket that follows the track and spins out the first kart it catches, and a mine you drop behind you.

Because the boxes are weighted by position. The leader mostly draws mines, which defend, and whoever is last mostly draws rockets, which attack. With equal odds the driver in front finds a rocket, extends the gap and the race is over at the first corner. Weighting the boxes keeps four karts in one pack, which is the whole point of a four-player race.

Three, and they play differently rather than just looking different. Sunset Bay is the balanced circuit, Dune Pass is fast and open which suits boosts and rockets, and Alpine Ridge is short and technical over four laps where braking decides almost everything. You pick one before the race; in multiplayer the host chooses and everyone races the same circuit.

The race carries on with AI karts rather than freezing, and if you rejoin with the same room code you are dropped straight back into the running race instead of starting again. Your place on the grid and your colour stay the same, because both are worked out from the room rather than chosen by your device.

Your driver name and race record are stored in your browser, so they are there when you come back. There is nothing to unlock and no upgrade to buy — every kart on the grid is identical, and the only difference between them is who is driving.