Swedish developer Zordix is bringing a challenging and one-of-a-kind racing game with Overpass, unique because it focuses on extreme terrain. This will be something that most racing fans on Xbox will have to get used too. I have to confess, I had to use the restart option more than 100 times while playing the tutorial. Precision, knowing where to place your wheels and not speed is the way how you succeed in Overpass! Read on and see why Overpass is a real fresh air in the racing genre!
What we liked!
- The same “edge on your seat” feeling as rally games: Surviving the obstacle courses gives you the same feeling as rally games. Every little mistake can cost you seconds and a big drop on the overall leaderboards. On the edge of your seat, you are calculating (and on my part guessing) how to overcome a mud pile or a steep climb. This is a new experience too as other racing games don’t have anything similar. Only pressing the acceleration button isn’t enough to be a winner here, knowing at what speed, how and where to turn your wheels, knowing when to change your 4WD, 2WD or differential locks is very important in Overpass.
- Thumbs up for the music selection! Great music! That’s one of the first things that came to mind when I played Overpass. It has an excellent selection of some rock songs that get you into the right mood.
Somewhere between
- ATV’s physics are unpredictable: I can live with restarting a section when I messed up, but sometimes the game fucks up for you. This happens more with ATV’s by the way! The weight just doesn’t feel right. Doing a slight turn causing an immediate rollover giving zero chance to recover leaves you with a sour taste. While 80% of the physics gives fun and challenging gameplay 20% is as unpredictable as Trump.
- Lighting, mud and smoke effects: Overpass is a game somewhere in the middle when it comes to visuals. One thing that’s really brilliant is the particle effects, the way how mud reforms, get on your screen and buggy or ATV is really well done. There is a slight issue with frame rates, especially on later laps as the game remembers mud tracks from previous passages but nothing really annoying.
What we disliked
- Reaching the limit of frustration: I’m a gamer that doesn’t quit a Fifa match when the opponent just scored a 5-0 (although that hardly ever happens) or that likes Dark Souls for the difficult gameplay. Overpass however can become very frustrating when you have to restart a section for the 55 times, and trust me every gamer will have to restart Overpass on a regular basis. At one point in the tutorial you have to find your own way to reach the top of a small hill, I literally tried for 15 minutes before I finally succeeded in reaching the next checkpoint. You can skip it altogether but if you do that you’ll never learn how to play Overpass.
- You simply don’t know if your vehicle is up to the task?! In my experience, the game has one big problem with the career mode. Particular events require specific cars or upgrades but you don’t get a warning if you start without them. This combines two problems, the first one is that I suck at the game and that’s not the fault from the developers the second problem can and hopefully will be fixed by Zordix. You can start an event without actually having the right car and upgrades, utterly frustrating to get stuck on a hill because your car simply can’t deal with it.
Overpass brings something entirely new to the racing genre, having to consider terrain and wheel placement isn’t something that I’ve done before and was really fun to play. This isn’t the kind of game that will be loved by every gamer but bringing such gameplay mechanics for hardcore gamers should be applauded!
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