Maverick Game’s Open-World Racer Clutch Is Set on the French Riviera, Features Monaco

New UK racing studio Maverick Games has revealed a first look at the location, characters, and story of its upcoming open-world action-driving game Clutch during the Summer Game Fest 2026 showcase.

Clutch’s open-world world is inspired by the iconic Mediterranean coastline of the French Riviera, with the official announcement from the studio stating it will feature miles of diverse roads and terrain, and that players will be able to “weave through vibrant city streets, conquer dramatic mountain switchbacks and unleash top speed on breathtaking coastal highways.”

“Clutch is set in Monaco and the surrounding French Riviera,” Maverick Games founder Mike Brown tells IGN. “We’ve built a version of Monaco that is actually larger than real-life Monaco. So Monaco, known for being quite dense and tight, we’ve allowed our level designers to add a little bit of space here and there – but every main road, every main landmark is present and correct. But the actual footprint of the space is larger than real-life Monaco.

“And then that’s surrounded by a sprawling French Riviera that goes up as high as the Alps and out to the Verdon Gorge, and then as far to the west as Saint-Tropez. We have three city hubs along the coast; you’ve got Monaco, and then Cannes, and then Saint-Tropez. So a huge world to explore and one that, we think, everywhere you go there’s real beautiful things to explore and see.”

The studio has also debuted a story trailer for Clutch, and detailed how its characters find themselves straddling a trio of different worlds, including professional circuit racing, a nighttime underground street racing scene, and intense, high-speed pursuits and getaways. With a script by Scottish TV writer Jamie Brittain (the co-creator of acclaimed British teen drama Skins), Clutch is the story of Theo Martial and his younger sister, Cass. With the guidance of his adoptive father Ludo, Theo is a star driver in the revered Riviera 1000 racing tournament – the R1K. For the purposes of Clutch, the R1K is the most prestigious event in all motorsport, and Ludo is a former champion of the tournament.

After the R1K is rocked by a tragic accident on track, however, its current custodian George McBride plans to introduce new technology to prevent any further incidents. This controversial plan splits the drivers, and eventually leads Theo to the Midnight Collective – the underground street racing community based in the area – and into an adjacent spot of trouble that leaves him owing favours to the wrong sort of people. It’s at this point, however, that Theo discovers a conspiracy at the heart of the R1K.

During Clutch we’ll race as both Theo, played by Tosin Cole (Supacell, Doctor Who), and Cass, played by Little Simz (Top Boy, Venom: Let There Be Carnage).

“Depending on how much of a fan of UK hip hop you are will determine how excited you are about that inclusion,” jokes Brown. “But Little Simz is basically the biggest name in UK hip hop at the moment – probably the biggest female rapper in the world – and she’s also a great actor. If you’ve seen Top Boy, she plays the love interest of the main character, she was in the second Venom movie, she had a movie on Netflix last year called Steve where she starred alongside Cillian Murphy, and she also played Glastonbury main stage, as well. She was also at Coachella as well, a few weeks ago, so she’s a very, very big talent in both screen and on stage.”

French actor Grégory Montel stars as the pair’s father Ludo, and Peter Serafinowicz (who you may recall from Shaun of the Dead, or as The Sommelier in John Wick: Chapter 2) features as R1K boss George McBride. Clutch will also feature Jane Perry, who is the BAFTA award-winning voice of the lead character in 2021’s Returnal, as well as Agent 47’s handler Diana Burnwood in the most recent Hitman trilogy. She was also the voice of the in-car navigation in the first two Forza Horizon games, which is humorous considering how adjacent Clutch’s world finds itself to Forza Horizon 2 (which was also set on a segment of the French Riviera, centred around Nice.

It’s an entertaining coincidence that Clutch and Forza Horizon 2 find themselves such close neighbours, considering developer Maverick Games itself is within walking distance of Forza Horizon developer Playground Games.

“In this specific area, it all does kinda flower originally out of Codemasters,” explains Brown, formerly of Playground Games, where he worked on a number of Forza Horizon games and was the creative director of Forza Horizon 5. “There is/was a massive developer [and] publisher just outside Leamington Spa that employed loads and loads of people, and built many, many very good racing games, and then that just builds a level of talent that then can flower out and start new studios, and it’s kinda grown out of that.

“It is unusual and it’s unique. I don’t think there’s anything really else like it anywhere in the world, or in the games industry, where you can point to one thing – in this case, Codemasters – that then just leads to this growth and growth in what is actually quite a specialised thing, in racing games. It’s not just in video games, it is actually racing. Because there’s even Sumo Leamington, which is slightly different, but still in racing. Even these other studios that you might not immediately think of are still in Leamington doing racing, or racing adjacent work.

“Anywhere else in the world, if you tell people you’re a game designer, they’re like, ‘Bloody hell, that’s interesting! What’s that like?’ In this town, if you say you work in the games industry, it’s like, ‘Yeah, obviously.’ It’s as normal as saying you’re a geography teacher.”

Maverick Games revealed Clutch for the first time earlier this week. Described as a “cinematic open-world action-driving game,” Clutch will launch in Spring 2027 on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC.

Here's everything announced at Summer Game Fest 2026 if you need a catch up on what else the video game industry has in store.

Luke is a Senior Editor on the IGN reviews team. You can track him down on Bluesky @mrlukereilly to ask him things about stuff.