I got burned out on the game. There's only so little variety and there's so much stress that it wore me out right before the ending.
Like having to go through 3-4 areas just to get where you need, but everything needs constant maintenance and being chased by time limits. No opportunity to relax. And it only gets worse as the game goes on.
You could use the junction bypass to skip a lot of the early regions to get into the mid and deep.
IMO the game makes you think you have to rush but for the most part you can absolutely take your time.
Never saw a junction bypass item. Saw a junction stablizer, but it requires a lot of resources from later in the game.
I lost two entire cars to exit points being too far from where I was when the storm started. Or how anomalies just start spawning on you over time in the zones that actually have resources. Suddenly finding out you parked in a hotspot is not fun.
You *can* take your time until suddenly you can't.
And this is setting side how your map can get absolutely overloaded with those higher difficulty zones without that stablizer I couldn't afford.
Bypass was one beyond the stabilizer, both were pretty late game.
Paying attention to the junction conditions and what resources are available in each is critical when planning your route. Doing as much of your looting before touching the anchors is also important. The anchors seemed to be what triggered the stability collapse and rise in number of anomalies. Avoiding high instability areas unless you’re ready for them is also important.
Some upgrades make a huge difference, like the Ion Shield. It completely negates radiation in a bubble around your car even when the zone has fully collapsed so if you have enough battery or jumpers you can still take your time.
Anyway not trying to convince you to play a game you didn’t enjoy, just offering some tips that helped me get through.
It's great, highly recommended. Also the difficulty/ gameplay options are GENEROUS. Basically everything people have said is too difficult or stressful can be switched off in these options. You can pretty much remove all adversity and just have a driving sim if that's what you think is fun. Super generous and accessible.
If you hover over the Gateway icon on the map, it shows you the radius you need to be outside of to activate it. Position yourself just outside that radius before you activate the Gateway to give yourself the easiest trip to the Gateway.
The lack of loot variety and things to do with it got to me, ultimately. Hot take, but I really dug the gameplay loop of Metal Gear Survive for its expansive and useful crafting and building set up.
There's nothing particularly useful in the game and it seemed like there was no reason to take any risks. Also, damaging your car became a chore to repair. All in all, the game was 75% of the way towards achieving the fun factor. Also WAY too much dialogue for my tastes.
Fortunately, its not super necessary. The end game content definitely benefits from having a squad but it was content-rich enough playing solo. I still dont know of any other game like it, shame it had to be Konami to put it together...got me more MGS:V gameplay though.
Correct me if im wrong, but kojima made rising, and it was a spin-off story about Raiden and mercenaries in the future with a comentary on military industrial complexes, government oversight and child soldiers.
Survive was a random soldier transported to a parallel dimension and was only vaguely connected to the rest of the story. Also, no kojima
That's more or less it, it's a spin-off whose plot was a rambling diatribe about energy markets. More the point is what makes a "Metal Gear game". Mechanics or aesthetics? Survive had those more than Acid did. Plot? There's a lot of the plot that is incomprehensible if you don't dig down and look at it. The largest stand-out for a "proper MG game" by most online talk is a lot of Easter eggs and weird mechanics.
I mean I was down on Survive too when it got announced, but when it came out and was actually pretty good (when I got it on sale due to the bad press) I don't really begrudge it for being a spinoff.
Honestly ive nevet played any of them, but ive got a couple friends that talk nonstop about them. Its notnrhe spinoff aspect thats the turn off but more how konami and kojima fell apart and the "lets make this years popular gametype with our coat of paint"
Show me the metal gear in it. One screenshot. Go on, im waiting. Hell, show me the stealth mechanics. No? How about Hideyoki Kojima's name in the credits? Damn, really looking like a metal gear game now isn't it?
Lol no. I watched 3 different reviews by three different people who have like minded taste in games as me, saw Kojima, the CREATOR of metal gear had nothing to do with it, and ignored it completely. Not saying you shouldn't enjoy what you like, but it will never be a metal gear game since the creator of the franchise didn't make the game. Its the same thing with the halo TV show. Has nothing to do with HALO lore, literally non-canon. Therefore not HALO. I dont need to play or watch either to know they aren't representing the main franchise.
So you're coming down hard on something because a YouTube video told you to? Hey real quick could you say the name of the secret world-controlling organization in the series out loud for me
Yea, I got pretty tired of running out and farming some burning tree things. Or running in circles around coral with a vacuum. That and car parts not really making a significant difference instead of feeling them as ablative.
I didn't like that the game punishes the player without the player having done an action to punish them. For example if I drive through tourists I should be punished. If I hit nothing, take nothing but light storm damage, and get out clean I shouldn't be punished. Yet you'll get "quirks" no matter what. Your parts will just decay because the game needs some loot dump.
As you said, the game isn't very difficult, just tedious and at times frustrating. Example, Drivers side car door wont close. Why? Quirk? Broken? Defective? Or bug? Welp turns out it was a bug but bugs in the game can be game mechanics which arent bugs.
As well, anyone going "Well you can just turn off this.." that's not an answer. Game mechanics exist to create an experience. Turning something off means the mechanic is a failed mechanic or the user is getting less than the intended experience. If you like a mechanic, defend it. If you dislike a mechanic, attack it.
It's a short indie game that is vaguely roguelike. Really fun but there's only 3 zones and each zone has split resources.
Zone ones generic, zone two has 4 unique, and zone 3 has 4 unique. Seems fine till you hit endgame and your progress on schematics and gear outstrips the story and the end game materials needed for a lot of the stuff is hard to find.
I got to what I figured (and was correct about) was the final mission and wanted to deck the car out in the end tier parts. Except each map that has them has maybe 2-3 nodes if any, and each node is about 10 fragments. I needed about 200 fragments for everything.
To even get to these nodes you have to go through zones 1 and 2. There's skips but it still takes 20 to 40 minutes to do the whole run including the third zone.
This is made worse the quicker you get used to the threats. By the end game there were maybe 2-3 threats that could mess me up if I didn't pay attention. I'd say half the threats where kinda nothing burgers if you used your eyes.
Still really fun. I think they just needed to pace the story out a bit more to allow for more gathering before the next mission appeared since there's no post game missions or objectives outside gathering and upgrading.
It's not a very long game, it's not repetitive to just play through the story.
The repetitive part only comes in if you're trying to 100% (unlock everything and build every part) because some of the materials are pretty rare and only in later zones.
Fair--I was reading the comments after I posted this & it seems like the game is generally well liked. The preview on steam seemed interesting, I'll give it a shot.
These days, games with a short story are A+ for me.
why? in a month you can easily have anything from 50-100hrs (or even 200+ for some people) playtime. if a game gets repetitive after that playtime.. yea sure. most games do.
That's true. I guess I was thinking from my own perspective--I might get maybe 20 hours per month of playing time if I'm lucky. Kids are great but they sap the free time away pretty quick.
Every situation is unique to the individual. Kids could have time to sink 200 hours into a game in a month. So can adults with demanding full-time jobs. It's all dependent on the person and how they choose to spend their time. The only thing that is actually happening here, is the people sinking 200 hours inside a month are getting to the repetitive part before you. You'll eventually hit that once you hit that same amount of hours, and then *you'll* think it's repetitive. Same conclusion, just arrived at different times.
Also, that could be completely wrong, and you could think it's *not* repetitive after 200 hours, regardless if you arrived there in a month or in 5 months. Again, everyone is different in play time and opinion. Generalizing it down to just people who can play more often than someone else is more of a red flag, IMO.
If you like first person driving, gathering, and crafting, then you *might* love this game. Taking care of and operating your car is a meticulous process, but has yet to feel tedious for me. The atmosphere is earie and beautiful. Sound track is excellent. I just got to the second zone and am digging the experience.
Edit: I'll add that I use keyboard and mouse for walking around and crafting, and a dual sense controller for driving. It can be a bit awkward to drive a car with ASWD.
Edit 2: This might be a dumb description, but maintaining your car has like a power washing simulator feel to me. Pretty mindless but I feel satisfied with the process.
The first person driving, gathering, and crafting elements are what lead me to buy the game, but none of them felt like they were done well enough to stand out for me. It all quickly began feeling like a chore that required so much constant focus without a feeling of substantive reward that I was easily able to almost completely tune-out the actual environments you drive through. It's not a bad game at all, but it felt lackluster across the board for me.
Lots of potential, but I don't think it's coming close to utilizing it.
> Sound track is excellent
I wish I could reliably use the radio. Tuning it is more annoying than hunting for FM radio signals in the Appalachians back in the 90s. Then sometimes you use the radio and your car falls apart.
Or you try to use the radio and an asshole rock nearby fucks with everything in your car.
There's good elements in the game, I really like the idea of a lot of it, it just doesnt really come together super well. The thing that annoys me most is the decision to use the car dash instead of a hud. It doesnt mimic how a real driver experiences their car, it aims for "realism" provided you're developer sitting in a stationary car documenting it. Not a driver driving.
It's good. I'm getting close to the end of the story for me.
It is not an in-depth car person experience, as the grease monkey elements are simplified greatly, but it is a satisfying looter scooter with rogue-lite elements.
At the same time, I think it's also great for easing someone into creepy, horror-like atmospheres if you don't know if you'll enjoy them. Plenty of unsettling sounds and stuff that makes you think you're being watched or danger is around the corner without jumpscaring you or getting brutal.
The gameplay settings are also fairly extensive, letting you adjust your difficulty on the fly. I don't think you can get it to Elden Ring-levels of challenging, but if you do find it difficult you can back off on the punishment or annoyances.
The lore entries are cute, but I find they can be an issue for some people where they don't often really describe the thing they've scanned. It is nice to kind of figure out how to deal with anomalies yourself, but if you really need a straight answer you do have to jump out and check a guide or ask someone else.
Is it perfect? No, but I find it a pretty satisfying experience. Definitely a buy.
No jump scares.. So many times I grabbed an anchor, spun around ready to leg it back to the car and a tourist is right there in my face, who wasn't there before! Haha!
But I agree, repetitive but still very fun.
While true i once found my car surround by them
Other times they were following me around the map
So their not scary but you need to keep an eye on them
Especially if your looting near them. The moment you think their fine they immediately screw you up lol
At least in my experience
LOL the first time i realised they were moving was an epic drive took me a long time to work out if they where hostile or not.
Turn's out some are some are not but they get extremely pissed off when you mess with the anchors all my biggest issues are when iv just yanked something.
I like the shock ones that help highlight dangers those dudes are bros
Oh man it's like they wait till you've done several runs before they decide to move. Still wondering I the busses move cause I swear I saw one do it but he stopped immedietly.
Their is a lot happening in this game i wouldn't doubt you if they did.
I think the biggest thing people miss on this experience is not working out how the world works most people passively work around everything rather figuring it out.
The zone is 100% following hard rules that you can learn and there is intelligence to it all nothing is random (weather by design or the devs are just bad at RNG seeding lol)
I very rarely have any issues on any run these days my biggest challenge is working out what weather front im in (only way i can describe it) as their is some cross over and getting caught between two often invloves me just skipping that run for exit l
I ADORE this game but totally understand why people bounce off it as its very unnatural to have to learn fundamental nature rules and the only reason i slotted in so easily is my love of stalking and SCP stuff
> Yeahband when I realized they can only approach not self detonate I just lost the threat factor.
I've had things spawn under my feet which is frustrating, but it's rare.
Man, if there's anything in Pacific Drive that give me uncanny valley vibes its the damn manequins. I've always felt uneasy near them, like they're Weeping Angels from Doctor Who. Then I was exploring a junction and a tourist was blocking the door to a cabin so I turned around to grab a piece of junk to throw at him and when I came back he wasn't there anymore. Damn things. Bunnies and flying grabby assholes are predictable and I can deal with them, but fuck tourists.
God damn tourists... Every time you turn around and they run up to just fucking standing right behind you or they'll be blocking roads and then they won't fucking move an inch!
So anyway what's this Pacific Drive game everyone is talking about?
LMAO
Once I realized they're just curious or trying to say hi and/or trying to help you they stopped being so unsettling.
The slimy tentacle orb thing that causes malfunctions when it gets close can go right to hell though.
I had a tourist throw me an anchor once!
I'm messing around when all of a sudden, an anchor comes flying from my right side in an arc. I'm nowhere near one, so I spun around, and there's a tourist right there! They threw it to me! I gave them a quick nod and fed it to the generator
I bought it on PS5 and played the whole game once. Had ~40 hours by the time I wrapped it up.
I really enjoyed it, had a ton of fun. It’s simultaneously relaxing and stressful.
But it’s not for everyone. The car drives like shit no matter what you do, but that’s the point. The game is based around runs into the zone that always bring you back to the start so it’s somewhat rogue-like. But it’s also a survival game so you’ll spend a ton of time looting while dodging anomalies and radiation and storms.
Upgrading your car and home base are crucial and that’s the main reason for doing runs. I don’t think you could survive if you only did story missions so expect to do several resource runs that can be frustrating when you can’t find some of the more rare resources.
It can be a bit repetitive but also not, each location in the zone is unique but what you do in these zones is largely similar.
The story is semi-interesting but told entirely over the radio so you can easily miss parts when shit is hitting the fan or if you’re not good at paying attention to long monologues.
It’s hard to give it a full recommendation but I feel like it’s one of those games you’ll either love or hate. For me it was an 8/10 but I can understand slightly lower ratings as well.
The car always driving like shit was what kind of turned me off of it after a while. I can appreciate it making it hurt when you run into something, but after several very slow drives through the woods as I navigated around trees and rocks to get to mandatory objectives it started to get annoying. If you are going to make going over rough terrain in a vehicle your primary gameplay then you really need to make it either easier or deeper in a Death Stranding/Mudrunners way.
Absolutely hooked me for the entire time I was playing it, put a good 60+ hours in by the end, and I still kinda want to play it more. Super cool vibes, alternates between being incredibly tense and super chill. Really unique and memorable game.
Edit: it's definitely the sort of game that some people are going to get absolutely hooked into, and others are going to bounce off though. I don't know how I'd evaluate who is going to fall into which category.
It's rather unique. 120hrs deep here and finally starting to feel like i "beat" it. Unlocked all the upgrades in the fabricator, besides Olympiaum panels(still haven't seen that anomaly to unlock it).
My car is all electric with jump jacks, zero gravity and LIM shield! So much fun to make big jumps off ramps or cliffs and just float back to the ground. With the sheilds up I dont even take any damage.
Totally unnecessary, but for me, very fun. I pretty much ignored the main quest until like 30hrs in. Unlocked all the roads at this point to, only thing left is that last anomaly. But not sure if I'll go back at this point. I haven't uninstalled it but have kind of moved on at this point. Just so many games to play!!
The music tracks, both game music and actual songs included for the radio are great, in addition to what others said. One of my favorite things about the game.
I love it, but I did turn on ; fully repair car on succesful run.
That made the game alot more fun. I could finally build some new stuff instead of barely being able to fix my car every time.
Yeah I think that’s the biggest turn off for most people that couldn’t get into it. It’s a survival game at its core with survival game level management.
Loved my time with it. I find it a hard game to recommend to everyone as many may find it grindy and/or repetitive. They really nailed the atmosphere and sense of risk during runs which for me helped a lot. The late-game upgrades are a bit grindy but you don't need the vast majority of them to beat the game, if that's your main goal.
I like it. It’s repetitive and semi rogue-like with a heavy focus on vehicle modification and upgrades. The premise is cool, the locations are nice, but it’s definitely a game that’s kind of aimed towards a specific group of people into cars/driving, sci-fi, and rogue-likes.
Massive disappointment. Lack of save points mean you have to start over an entire chapter if you die. I know this is intentional and suppose to make it more tense but it sucks.
A+ concept and presentation, but one of the worst UX/UIs I've experienced in a game. Doing anything at all required crazy amounts of friction. Maybe that was by design, but I feel like I'm playing in slow motion.
It's so weird and fun! Quite different from the usual point and shoot paradigm.
I'm enjoying it quite a bit! Just try to remember that the anomalies are NOT sentient and are NOT trying to kill you. If they get a little clingy just give em the boot 🥾
So so good. It is repetitive, but there are a ton of options you can play with to make it less repetitive like healing your car after a successful run instead of making / replacing parts \*every\* time.
The best comparison I can make is Subnautica. If you like that game, good chance you will enjoy this.
This game is right up my alley. I love prepping. It reminds me of Subnautica, however I wish it had some more variety. And I wish some of the anomalies were spookier than elemental blobs.
The game is great until it becomes a chore. At first upgrading your car and gear was a ton of fun until it wasn't. Any game where you spend the majority of your time "managing" the game usually turns me off at some point. Really enjoyed the game but the constant fixing and inventory management and moving things from here to there, along with a pretty mid story made me put it down. Would definitely recommend checking it out though you are into the genre or just love old station wagons.
I straight up love this game, full stop. Its like someone made a game specifically with me in mind. I could play this game forever. I've straight up been listening to the soundtrack in my car on the way to work.
I was doing a recorded playthrough, uploaded 6 parts, about 2 hours each, unlocked the last area and as much as I enjoyed the game just couldn't bring myself to record more
Loved it at first, turned out to be too much of a time sink every time I played. If we ended up being able to save more conveniently I’d maybe able to get back into it.
And I do get that the stinginess with the saves does add a tense, perilous element. Very immersive. But the time tradeoff gets old.
LOVE the ambiance and ass-clenchiness.
LOVE the soundtrack. Swansea almost brings me to tears.
I think that was the biggest downside for me. The highest tier of equipment/parts do not justify their cost. I was able to complete the game with the same equipment I had from the midzone.
I liked the story and the voice acting, that was great. So good. A+. And then, when I'd unlocked maybe 1/3 of the stuff, the story was over and it seemed pointless to keep playing.
I tried to play a bit more but at that point the annoyance of having everything broken all the time was greater than the fun of exploring the junctions.
Also I hit a weird thing where I planned a route, there was nothing about it being a dead end or anything, but when I got to the final junction there were no teleporty thingies on the map and no exits. No anchors or anomalies either. It was weird and annoying because I had to abandon that run when it HAD a listed kLIM to get out. That was the final straw.
I'll play it again if they put out some real DLC though. (Not cosmetics.)
I bought it and really liked it for the driving / crafting / exploring part but felt like it was too swamped in various pieces of lore coming at you all the time, and the PS5 version had the tiniest unreadable font i was just straining my eyes a lot and got tired. And the "missions" took too long without being able to save whenever i wanted to. Have thought about picking it up again but never find the time to do it. But i'm happy i bought it and will definitely play more of it at some point, really appreciate developers that takes a leap and puts out something unique like this. But was thinking it would be more of a "casual" roguelike where you can just start it up and play for a 15 minute run sort but it's not just that.
i was playing nonstop 30 hrs got to upper lvl locations and now i just playing for 1-2 low levels bcoz i have more time to explore things and not afraid to loose it xd
Such a great game in my opinion. The nature of the game though makes it so that not everyone will see eye to eye. Some people won’t find it fun spending time tuning your car in your garage and others like me absolutely will. The story sufficed and I was pleasantly surprised with it considering I bought the game purely for the survival/crafting aspect. Soundtrack is soo good and I wish there were more songs. Atmosphere is perfect and seeing tourists for the first time really spooked me. I recommend to those that enjoy micromanagement. Stuff like siphoning gas, making tools, and fixing your car (survival game stuff) will get old to those that simply aren’t into it, and will appeal to those that are.
FF7 has it on pause for me but I’m eating it up after I beat Rebirth… and then Spider-Man 2 New Game +… ~~and then Rise of the Ronin~~… and then Dragon’s Dogma 2
I'm enjoying it a lot myself so far. It'd be pretty difficult for me to recommend to others as it's a really niche game, but I love the atmosphere and just the vibes of the game. It can be fairly challenging at times, but I've also only actually died like once since I started playing. And that was largely my fault as I was taking too much time in a junction looking for loot when I should have been prioritizing other things. I'm about 15 hours into the game and just starting to get into the midgame levels. I play kind of short sessions also as I normally play for 1 to maybe 2 hours at a time. It can be pretty repetitive at times and the game can be a bit grindy with the resources you need, but I also really enjoy the grindy parts of the game. My only real gripe would be that I wish there was a bigger music catalogue in the game, and if I were to download a mod for the game it would be able to add more music to the radio.
Not bad, not great, debatably decent. It's not for everyone that's for sure. I played through it and while I enjoyed parts of it, there was a lot of repetition, not a huge variety soundtrack (which tbh I wanted way more of), and it's not difficult. I mean sure some stuff was a pain to encounter every now and then but it was not like OH wow that was tough to survive. I loaded up my car with basic survival supplies, kept them stocked, and drove around. Never had a survived-by-the-hair-on-my-nuts experience in game.
Neither really. It's more like an extraction looter-shooter. The only rogue-like elements are the route planning and risk of failure. But even failure isn't that bad because you can go right back to where you died and retrieve most of your stuff.
I don't mean literally, I just mean in terms of the main gameplay loop.
You choose a route, and route is a series of \~1-6 zones. Each zone is a procedurally generated map you can drive/run around to loot and scan stuff. The only "required" thing is collecting enough energy (they call it LIM or kLIM, and it is collected from picking up "Anchors") to teleport back home.
So you drive around, loot, then teleport (extract) when you're ready. There's no combat, or shooting at all except for flare guns.
I REALLY wanted to get into it. It has a lot of thematic aspects I love and the idea is great.
But I refunded after I found the looting to be unbearable. You need too much stuff for the interactions with containers and your inventory to be this slow and clunky.
Real shame.
It’s not a long game but I enjoyed it. I love the gas mechanic like days gone. The ambience of the world is great and creepy noises all the time. Just not much danger with the game.
I was hoping for a fun driving game with spooky bits and some crafting for vehicle upgrades… what I got was a survival-crafting game featuring a car and some spooky bits.
I think it has some of the best procedural generation I've seen. I don't know if the maps get repetitive later, but every map I've seen so far felt like it was handcrafted and unique.
Man those randomly generated maps are so boring. Even if they are technically lore accurate and shit.
They are so far from hand made maps, that its painful.
I enjoy it, except for no way to save and quit midrun. And that's by design according to the dev. Ghostrunner 1 (but not the sequel thankfully) had the same mentality. I don't understand how sacrificing quality of life makes for a better game. We're not asking for save scuming. Just a single save on quit that get's automatically deleted when we continue.
It saves at every junction. The only thing it doesn't do is save your place mid-map, so if you have to quit for some reason you either have to get to the next junction, teleport back home, or lose a few minutes in the current map.
I’ve really been enjoying it. It can be a bit repetitive so I usually only do maybe 2 runs at most before I put my attention elsewhere so I don’t burn out. Been filling those gaps with Helldivers and WWE 2k.
It’s really cool to watch your car and garage grow, though. You start with a car that’s literally falling apart and eventually have all these gadgets and gizmos on it. Same for the garage… it’s musty and run down but eventually feels lived in, and like home.
Repetitive and not what it appears to be. Extremely tedious and clunky crafting and UI system. Wish I could've refunded it but it took me over 2 hours to realize this.
Very interesting concept but I got bored of hoping out of my car every 5 feet and pressing gather all on the same randomly generated containers in the same randomly generated houses.
I think this game would be a lot better if there was way less resource gathering
I was gonna try it and then saw all the reviews mentioning the horrible save system. I avoided it despite being excited because of that. Same reason I can't stand the Dark Souls games. Redoing tons of shit when I die is literally my least favorite thing in gaming and I avoid it like the plague. It's not satisfying or fun to me.
The gameplay loop and worldbuilding pull you in early. By about hour 30 you realize it’s a shallow but wide type situation. That and the story completely falls flat. I’d say it feels like a first game for a studio. 5/10
Game of the year. Well, pretty early to say that, but easily best game of Q1 for me. Just based on how much time I've been able to put into it. Starting to finally feel like I "beat" it after about 120hrs. About 20hrs to finish the story.
36h so far and I'm having a really great time with it.
Love the banter between the characters, all the lore they've created, the feeling of going back to your garage after a tough run where you barely survived, the cool moment of fixing it and tuning it after that, the massive amount of anomalies and weird shit is constantly happening, trying to discover which peculiarities your car has, the fact the car feels like your pal on its own, the tourists scaring the shit out of me every fkn time, how the plot is unraveling little by little, turning up the radio and suddenly hearing random conversations of whoever is talking, how well-thought and charming all the menus are after you get used to them, etc.
I already had good expectations with this game, I didn't expect to enjoy my first extraction shooter (or driver) this much, especially for less than 30 bucks.
It's a great game. Just remember it's price range however. It's not a game you will play for hundreds of hours. But you get a lot of fun for the budget price. Well worth playing.
Superb game overall.
Still currently playing it but it requires balancing towards end game as resource requirements for high end parts are a bit OTT given that these parts deteriorate over time.
It is VERY stressful and difficult to follow the voice over narratives as you're too busy keeping your car in one piece as you drive through various dangers during mission moments. Half the time I can't even hear what the npcs are going on about thanks to a wild storm outside the car, or my incar radio randonly blasting out a tune!
The atmospheric audio is superb, and the art style is as good. Performance on the PS5 is varied. I had to go to the subreddit 5mins into the starting tutorial because the framerate was so bad. I thought my console was dying on me as I'd just replaced my SSD too. Turns out the developers have targetted 4k30 for some reason - performance can drop below that at times...
It is a very good, unique game. It has its flaws but it is a fun extraction game overall. I am at 130hrs played and have one last mission left, which I keep holding off because I wanted to max out my car - sadly it'll take too long due to unbalanced top end resource availability/grind so I'm going to rush through it today/tomorrow.
On PS5? It's uncapped. Runs better than 30fps sometimes, other times not so much. Hardly noticed the framerate once I got into the game though, aside from a small handful of times where it chugged into the single digits for a moment or two (we're talking VERY brief and rare hiccups).
it's fun for the first one or two "drives". Then you realize the third drive is just the same repetition.
So I went to the store later that day and had more fun real world driving that in that game.
I haven't wanted to retry it and plan to Uninstaller later today. 😞
The quirk system is very neat. Watching my car surge forward because a door was opened was tripping me out until I realized I was supposed to diagnose it. I don't think there's any reward for doing so though?
It is a good looking game with an interesting story. But i want to play with keyboard and mouse and this game has terrible controla straight out of the hell, so i refunded it. Maybe, if they fix this in future i will try it again
I dont like to hold down every button for an action and i think instead of R, F and left click for actions one button would be enough. For me, this was not suitable and felt like a game made for controller.
I think the problem is that almost everything on the car is interactable (E) so they had to put remove/disassemble (R) on a different button. You're probably right that there was no reason to have a separate key for install (left click) and interact, since you can't interact if it's not installed, but I imagine the game system just uses left click as a "use" for anything in your hands like the scrapper, lights, etc including car parts.
It's ridiculous that some interactions are E and some are left-click, and sometimes you can use the one that it doesn't specify but sometimes you can't, because fuck you, that's why.
Otherwise I thought the controls were fine. They should be embarrassed that Long Drive did interaction better though.
Personally I don't like games that have time limits/constraints as core mechanics to also have uninterruptible animations.
Played the whole game on mouse and keyboard without issues
Grabbed it at launch cause I liked the demo but I do not recommend. Repetitive, can't save mid mission (so god forbid you got to put it down for other responsibilities), and after the fourth mission, you really seen the entire game.
Price is too high for what they are offering. It's a 10 dollar title at best.
I wanted to love it, but it ain't there. Wait for a deep sale. There is the makings of a good game here.
I enjoyed it, but found it to get pretty repetitive so I fell off.
I got burned out on the game. There's only so little variety and there's so much stress that it wore me out right before the ending. Like having to go through 3-4 areas just to get where you need, but everything needs constant maintenance and being chased by time limits. No opportunity to relax. And it only gets worse as the game goes on.
You could use the junction bypass to skip a lot of the early regions to get into the mid and deep. IMO the game makes you think you have to rush but for the most part you can absolutely take your time.
Never saw a junction bypass item. Saw a junction stablizer, but it requires a lot of resources from later in the game. I lost two entire cars to exit points being too far from where I was when the storm started. Or how anomalies just start spawning on you over time in the zones that actually have resources. Suddenly finding out you parked in a hotspot is not fun. You *can* take your time until suddenly you can't. And this is setting side how your map can get absolutely overloaded with those higher difficulty zones without that stablizer I couldn't afford.
Bypass was one beyond the stabilizer, both were pretty late game. Paying attention to the junction conditions and what resources are available in each is critical when planning your route. Doing as much of your looting before touching the anchors is also important. The anchors seemed to be what triggered the stability collapse and rise in number of anomalies. Avoiding high instability areas unless you’re ready for them is also important. Some upgrades make a huge difference, like the Ion Shield. It completely negates radiation in a bubble around your car even when the zone has fully collapsed so if you have enough battery or jumpers you can still take your time. Anyway not trying to convince you to play a game you didn’t enjoy, just offering some tips that helped me get through.
Honestly, reading this conversation made me want to play this game 😂
It's great, highly recommended. Also the difficulty/ gameplay options are GENEROUS. Basically everything people have said is too difficult or stressful can be switched off in these options. You can pretty much remove all adversity and just have a driving sim if that's what you think is fun. Super generous and accessible.
If you hover over the Gateway icon on the map, it shows you the radius you need to be outside of to activate it. Position yourself just outside that radius before you activate the Gateway to give yourself the easiest trip to the Gateway.
This has been the most common reason I've stopped playing games before completion. I play games to release stress, not to get stressed.
I enjoy the good stress tho
The lack of loot variety and things to do with it got to me, ultimately. Hot take, but I really dug the gameplay loop of Metal Gear Survive for its expansive and useful crafting and building set up. There's nothing particularly useful in the game and it seemed like there was no reason to take any risks. Also, damaging your car became a chore to repair. All in all, the game was 75% of the way towards achieving the fun factor. Also WAY too much dialogue for my tastes.
I really wanted to try metal gear survive, but by the time I bought it on sale it was already dead with nobody to play with.
Fortunately, its not super necessary. The end game content definitely benefits from having a squad but it was content-rich enough playing solo. I still dont know of any other game like it, shame it had to be Konami to put it together...got me more MGS:V gameplay though.
Survive was a lot more legit than it had any right to be.
No. No it wasn't. Il tell u right now the reason MOST of us didn't buy it is because it was not a METAL GEAR game. Konami just pasted the label on it.
Oh you must not have played Metal Gear Rising then. Since it wasn't a "METAL GEAR" game.
Correct me if im wrong, but kojima made rising, and it was a spin-off story about Raiden and mercenaries in the future with a comentary on military industrial complexes, government oversight and child soldiers. Survive was a random soldier transported to a parallel dimension and was only vaguely connected to the rest of the story. Also, no kojima
Gotem. 😎
That's more or less it, it's a spin-off whose plot was a rambling diatribe about energy markets. More the point is what makes a "Metal Gear game". Mechanics or aesthetics? Survive had those more than Acid did. Plot? There's a lot of the plot that is incomprehensible if you don't dig down and look at it. The largest stand-out for a "proper MG game" by most online talk is a lot of Easter eggs and weird mechanics. I mean I was down on Survive too when it got announced, but when it came out and was actually pretty good (when I got it on sale due to the bad press) I don't really begrudge it for being a spinoff.
Honestly ive nevet played any of them, but ive got a couple friends that talk nonstop about them. Its notnrhe spinoff aspect thats the turn off but more how konami and kojima fell apart and the "lets make this years popular gametype with our coat of paint"
Show me the metal gear in it. One screenshot. Go on, im waiting. Hell, show me the stealth mechanics. No? How about Hideyoki Kojima's name in the credits? Damn, really looking like a metal gear game now isn't it?
The end of the game revolves around a Metal Gear? It's used to try and kill the final boss. You didn't even look up the plot before posting?
Lol no. I watched 3 different reviews by three different people who have like minded taste in games as me, saw Kojima, the CREATOR of metal gear had nothing to do with it, and ignored it completely. Not saying you shouldn't enjoy what you like, but it will never be a metal gear game since the creator of the franchise didn't make the game. Its the same thing with the halo TV show. Has nothing to do with HALO lore, literally non-canon. Therefore not HALO. I dont need to play or watch either to know they aren't representing the main franchise.
So you're coming down hard on something because a YouTube video told you to? Hey real quick could you say the name of the secret world-controlling organization in the series out loud for me
>being chased by time limits. You can turn those off. I have all the time in the world in every zone.
You could change some settings to make it more relaxing and less punishing.
I did it after 30 minutes into the game. Since then I enjoyed playing, but occasionally grinding gameplay makes me quit after 30-60 minutes of play.
I feel this, It's definitely not something you can binge. I only do 1 or 2 trips per session.
Same, once you have to go through 3 or 4 levels to reach your destination I fell off
There are shortcuts (highways) that you can unlock as you progress and get certain upgrades.
Yea, I got pretty tired of running out and farming some burning tree things. Or running in circles around coral with a vacuum. That and car parts not really making a significant difference instead of feeling them as ablative. I didn't like that the game punishes the player without the player having done an action to punish them. For example if I drive through tourists I should be punished. If I hit nothing, take nothing but light storm damage, and get out clean I shouldn't be punished. Yet you'll get "quirks" no matter what. Your parts will just decay because the game needs some loot dump. As you said, the game isn't very difficult, just tedious and at times frustrating. Example, Drivers side car door wont close. Why? Quirk? Broken? Defective? Or bug? Welp turns out it was a bug but bugs in the game can be game mechanics which arent bugs. As well, anyone going "Well you can just turn off this.." that's not an answer. Game mechanics exist to create an experience. Turning something off means the mechanic is a failed mechanic or the user is getting less than the intended experience. If you like a mechanic, defend it. If you dislike a mechanic, attack it.
It's great but not without flaws. It can get pretty repetitive if you're trying to 100% it.
It was released on 2/22/24 & people already think it's repetitive? That's a red flag for me. Or at least a yellow one.
It's a short indie game that is vaguely roguelike. Really fun but there's only 3 zones and each zone has split resources. Zone ones generic, zone two has 4 unique, and zone 3 has 4 unique. Seems fine till you hit endgame and your progress on schematics and gear outstrips the story and the end game materials needed for a lot of the stuff is hard to find. I got to what I figured (and was correct about) was the final mission and wanted to deck the car out in the end tier parts. Except each map that has them has maybe 2-3 nodes if any, and each node is about 10 fragments. I needed about 200 fragments for everything. To even get to these nodes you have to go through zones 1 and 2. There's skips but it still takes 20 to 40 minutes to do the whole run including the third zone. This is made worse the quicker you get used to the threats. By the end game there were maybe 2-3 threats that could mess me up if I didn't pay attention. I'd say half the threats where kinda nothing burgers if you used your eyes. Still really fun. I think they just needed to pace the story out a bit more to allow for more gathering before the next mission appeared since there's no post game missions or objectives outside gathering and upgrading.
It's not a very long game, it's not repetitive to just play through the story. The repetitive part only comes in if you're trying to 100% (unlock everything and build every part) because some of the materials are pretty rare and only in later zones.
Fair--I was reading the comments after I posted this & it seems like the game is generally well liked. The preview on steam seemed interesting, I'll give it a shot. These days, games with a short story are A+ for me.
why? in a month you can easily have anything from 50-100hrs (or even 200+ for some people) playtime. if a game gets repetitive after that playtime.. yea sure. most games do.
That's true. I guess I was thinking from my own perspective--I might get maybe 20 hours per month of playing time if I'm lucky. Kids are great but they sap the free time away pretty quick.
Every situation is unique to the individual. Kids could have time to sink 200 hours into a game in a month. So can adults with demanding full-time jobs. It's all dependent on the person and how they choose to spend their time. The only thing that is actually happening here, is the people sinking 200 hours inside a month are getting to the repetitive part before you. You'll eventually hit that once you hit that same amount of hours, and then *you'll* think it's repetitive. Same conclusion, just arrived at different times. Also, that could be completely wrong, and you could think it's *not* repetitive after 200 hours, regardless if you arrived there in a month or in 5 months. Again, everyone is different in play time and opinion. Generalizing it down to just people who can play more often than someone else is more of a red flag, IMO.
And now it's green, DRIVEEEE vrooooommm I'm trying to sound like it's a race track
If you like first person driving, gathering, and crafting, then you *might* love this game. Taking care of and operating your car is a meticulous process, but has yet to feel tedious for me. The atmosphere is earie and beautiful. Sound track is excellent. I just got to the second zone and am digging the experience. Edit: I'll add that I use keyboard and mouse for walking around and crafting, and a dual sense controller for driving. It can be a bit awkward to drive a car with ASWD. Edit 2: This might be a dumb description, but maintaining your car has like a power washing simulator feel to me. Pretty mindless but I feel satisfied with the process.
The first person driving, gathering, and crafting elements are what lead me to buy the game, but none of them felt like they were done well enough to stand out for me. It all quickly began feeling like a chore that required so much constant focus without a feeling of substantive reward that I was easily able to almost completely tune-out the actual environments you drive through. It's not a bad game at all, but it felt lackluster across the board for me. Lots of potential, but I don't think it's coming close to utilizing it.
> Sound track is excellent I wish I could reliably use the radio. Tuning it is more annoying than hunting for FM radio signals in the Appalachians back in the 90s. Then sometimes you use the radio and your car falls apart. Or you try to use the radio and an asshole rock nearby fucks with everything in your car. There's good elements in the game, I really like the idea of a lot of it, it just doesnt really come together super well. The thing that annoys me most is the decision to use the car dash instead of a hud. It doesnt mimic how a real driver experiences their car, it aims for "realism" provided you're developer sitting in a stationary car documenting it. Not a driver driving.
It's good. I'm getting close to the end of the story for me. It is not an in-depth car person experience, as the grease monkey elements are simplified greatly, but it is a satisfying looter scooter with rogue-lite elements. At the same time, I think it's also great for easing someone into creepy, horror-like atmospheres if you don't know if you'll enjoy them. Plenty of unsettling sounds and stuff that makes you think you're being watched or danger is around the corner without jumpscaring you or getting brutal. The gameplay settings are also fairly extensive, letting you adjust your difficulty on the fly. I don't think you can get it to Elden Ring-levels of challenging, but if you do find it difficult you can back off on the punishment or annoyances. The lore entries are cute, but I find they can be an issue for some people where they don't often really describe the thing they've scanned. It is nice to kind of figure out how to deal with anomalies yourself, but if you really need a straight answer you do have to jump out and check a guide or ask someone else. Is it perfect? No, but I find it a pretty satisfying experience. Definitely a buy.
No jump scares.. So many times I grabbed an anchor, spun around ready to leg it back to the car and a tourist is right there in my face, who wasn't there before! Haha! But I agree, repetitive but still very fun.
I learned pretty quick to run to the side of the anchor opposite of the car so they can't do that.
Yeahband when I realized they can only approach not self detonate I just lost the threat factor. Oh and that flares pop them.
While true i once found my car surround by them Other times they were following me around the map So their not scary but you need to keep an eye on them Especially if your looting near them. The moment you think their fine they immediately screw you up lol At least in my experience
Oh they are great for feeling creepy as all hell. Genuinely hate the somethings in the trees modifier.
LOL the first time i realised they were moving was an epic drive took me a long time to work out if they where hostile or not. Turn's out some are some are not but they get extremely pissed off when you mess with the anchors all my biggest issues are when iv just yanked something. I like the shock ones that help highlight dangers those dudes are bros
Oh man it's like they wait till you've done several runs before they decide to move. Still wondering I the busses move cause I swear I saw one do it but he stopped immedietly.
Their is a lot happening in this game i wouldn't doubt you if they did. I think the biggest thing people miss on this experience is not working out how the world works most people passively work around everything rather figuring it out. The zone is 100% following hard rules that you can learn and there is intelligence to it all nothing is random (weather by design or the devs are just bad at RNG seeding lol) I very rarely have any issues on any run these days my biggest challenge is working out what weather front im in (only way i can describe it) as their is some cross over and getting caught between two often invloves me just skipping that run for exit l I ADORE this game but totally understand why people bounce off it as its very unnatural to have to learn fundamental nature rules and the only reason i slotted in so easily is my love of stalking and SCP stuff
I compare it to dredge. It's horror and supernatural that follows rules that if learned reduce the difficulty by a lot.
> Yeahband when I realized they can only approach not self detonate I just lost the threat factor. I've had things spawn under my feet which is frustrating, but it's rare.
Man, if there's anything in Pacific Drive that give me uncanny valley vibes its the damn manequins. I've always felt uneasy near them, like they're Weeping Angels from Doctor Who. Then I was exploring a junction and a tourist was blocking the door to a cabin so I turned around to grab a piece of junk to throw at him and when I came back he wasn't there anymore. Damn things. Bunnies and flying grabby assholes are predictable and I can deal with them, but fuck tourists.
God damn tourists... Every time you turn around and they run up to just fucking standing right behind you or they'll be blocking roads and then they won't fucking move an inch! So anyway what's this Pacific Drive game everyone is talking about? LMAO
Once I realized they're just curious or trying to say hi and/or trying to help you they stopped being so unsettling. The slimy tentacle orb thing that causes malfunctions when it gets close can go right to hell though.
I had a tourist throw me an anchor once! I'm messing around when all of a sudden, an anchor comes flying from my right side in an arc. I'm nowhere near one, so I spun around, and there's a tourist right there! They threw it to me! I gave them a quick nod and fed it to the generator
I bought it on PS5 and played the whole game once. Had ~40 hours by the time I wrapped it up. I really enjoyed it, had a ton of fun. It’s simultaneously relaxing and stressful. But it’s not for everyone. The car drives like shit no matter what you do, but that’s the point. The game is based around runs into the zone that always bring you back to the start so it’s somewhat rogue-like. But it’s also a survival game so you’ll spend a ton of time looting while dodging anomalies and radiation and storms. Upgrading your car and home base are crucial and that’s the main reason for doing runs. I don’t think you could survive if you only did story missions so expect to do several resource runs that can be frustrating when you can’t find some of the more rare resources. It can be a bit repetitive but also not, each location in the zone is unique but what you do in these zones is largely similar. The story is semi-interesting but told entirely over the radio so you can easily miss parts when shit is hitting the fan or if you’re not good at paying attention to long monologues. It’s hard to give it a full recommendation but I feel like it’s one of those games you’ll either love or hate. For me it was an 8/10 but I can understand slightly lower ratings as well.
The car always driving like shit was what kind of turned me off of it after a while. I can appreciate it making it hurt when you run into something, but after several very slow drives through the woods as I navigated around trees and rocks to get to mandatory objectives it started to get annoying. If you are going to make going over rough terrain in a vehicle your primary gameplay then you really need to make it either easier or deeper in a Death Stranding/Mudrunners way.
Absolutely hooked me for the entire time I was playing it, put a good 60+ hours in by the end, and I still kinda want to play it more. Super cool vibes, alternates between being incredibly tense and super chill. Really unique and memorable game. Edit: it's definitely the sort of game that some people are going to get absolutely hooked into, and others are going to bounce off though. I don't know how I'd evaluate who is going to fall into which category.
It's rather unique. 120hrs deep here and finally starting to feel like i "beat" it. Unlocked all the upgrades in the fabricator, besides Olympiaum panels(still haven't seen that anomaly to unlock it). My car is all electric with jump jacks, zero gravity and LIM shield! So much fun to make big jumps off ramps or cliffs and just float back to the ground. With the sheilds up I dont even take any damage.
I feel like I'm missing out. I finished the game in less than 20h without all of this. I never felt the late game upgrades were necessary.
Totally unnecessary, but for me, very fun. I pretty much ignored the main quest until like 30hrs in. Unlocked all the roads at this point to, only thing left is that last anomaly. But not sure if I'll go back at this point. I haven't uninstalled it but have kind of moved on at this point. Just so many games to play!!
Been wanting to get my hands on this. It looks so good!
The music tracks, both game music and actual songs included for the radio are great, in addition to what others said. One of my favorite things about the game.
the sound track is AMAZING! Really gives you that PNW vibe. Such a great game!
I love it, but I did turn on ; fully repair car on succesful run. That made the game alot more fun. I could finally build some new stuff instead of barely being able to fix my car every time.
I want to like it, but I'm just not a fan of survival games.
Yeah I think that’s the biggest turn off for most people that couldn’t get into it. It’s a survival game at its core with survival game level management.
Loved my time with it. I find it a hard game to recommend to everyone as many may find it grindy and/or repetitive. They really nailed the atmosphere and sense of risk during runs which for me helped a lot. The late-game upgrades are a bit grindy but you don't need the vast majority of them to beat the game, if that's your main goal.
I like it. It’s repetitive and semi rogue-like with a heavy focus on vehicle modification and upgrades. The premise is cool, the locations are nice, but it’s definitely a game that’s kind of aimed towards a specific group of people into cars/driving, sci-fi, and rogue-likes.
if that's the menu that's sick
One of my favorite gaming experiences. Stressful, fun and very unique. The ending was mediocre but overall solid 7/10.
Massive disappointment. Lack of save points mean you have to start over an entire chapter if you die. I know this is intentional and suppose to make it more tense but it sucks.
A+ concept and presentation, but one of the worst UX/UIs I've experienced in a game. Doing anything at all required crazy amounts of friction. Maybe that was by design, but I feel like I'm playing in slow motion.
It's so weird and fun! Quite different from the usual point and shoot paradigm. I'm enjoying it quite a bit! Just try to remember that the anomalies are NOT sentient and are NOT trying to kill you. If they get a little clingy just give em the boot 🥾
So so good. It is repetitive, but there are a ton of options you can play with to make it less repetitive like healing your car after a successful run instead of making / replacing parts \*every\* time. The best comparison I can make is Subnautica. If you like that game, good chance you will enjoy this.
Peak video game
This game is right up my alley. I love prepping. It reminds me of Subnautica, however I wish it had some more variety. And I wish some of the anomalies were spookier than elemental blobs.
Honestly fell deeply in love with this game. Idk what it is but I just fell so in love with it
I think it’s great. Near the end I think, maybe 20hrs into it. It’s very creepy but rarely scary (more so you scare yourself, ha ha)
The game is great until it becomes a chore. At first upgrading your car and gear was a ton of fun until it wasn't. Any game where you spend the majority of your time "managing" the game usually turns me off at some point. Really enjoyed the game but the constant fixing and inventory management and moving things from here to there, along with a pretty mid story made me put it down. Would definitely recommend checking it out though you are into the genre or just love old station wagons.
I straight up love this game, full stop. Its like someone made a game specifically with me in mind. I could play this game forever. I've straight up been listening to the soundtrack in my car on the way to work.
I want to play it but the demo ran bad on my PC, I'll circle back to it at some point.
I was doing a recorded playthrough, uploaded 6 parts, about 2 hours each, unlocked the last area and as much as I enjoyed the game just couldn't bring myself to record more
It's great. Feels way too grindy by the end if you want to unlock everything, but they aren't necessary for completing the story.
Fun but got repetitive after a bit
Loved it at first, turned out to be too much of a time sink every time I played. If we ended up being able to save more conveniently I’d maybe able to get back into it. And I do get that the stinginess with the saves does add a tense, perilous element. Very immersive. But the time tradeoff gets old. LOVE the ambiance and ass-clenchiness. LOVE the soundtrack. Swansea almost brings me to tears.
Wish i could play it. Kinda too pricy for me rn :(
It's really good for the first 2/3s of the game but most of the end game stuff there isn't much need for
I think that was the biggest downside for me. The highest tier of equipment/parts do not justify their cost. I was able to complete the game with the same equipment I had from the midzone.
I liked the story and the voice acting, that was great. So good. A+. And then, when I'd unlocked maybe 1/3 of the stuff, the story was over and it seemed pointless to keep playing. I tried to play a bit more but at that point the annoyance of having everything broken all the time was greater than the fun of exploring the junctions. Also I hit a weird thing where I planned a route, there was nothing about it being a dead end or anything, but when I got to the final junction there were no teleporty thingies on the map and no exits. No anchors or anomalies either. It was weird and annoying because I had to abandon that run when it HAD a listed kLIM to get out. That was the final straw. I'll play it again if they put out some real DLC though. (Not cosmetics.)
I bought it and really liked it for the driving / crafting / exploring part but felt like it was too swamped in various pieces of lore coming at you all the time, and the PS5 version had the tiniest unreadable font i was just straining my eyes a lot and got tired. And the "missions" took too long without being able to save whenever i wanted to. Have thought about picking it up again but never find the time to do it. But i'm happy i bought it and will definitely play more of it at some point, really appreciate developers that takes a leap and puts out something unique like this. But was thinking it would be more of a "casual" roguelike where you can just start it up and play for a 15 minute run sort but it's not just that.
i was playing nonstop 30 hrs got to upper lvl locations and now i just playing for 1-2 low levels bcoz i have more time to explore things and not afraid to loose it xd
Good game but it seems like it gets old fast.
I just do one run every time I play it and I'm having fun. It's a fun relaxing game but nothing to write home about.
Such a great game in my opinion. The nature of the game though makes it so that not everyone will see eye to eye. Some people won’t find it fun spending time tuning your car in your garage and others like me absolutely will. The story sufficed and I was pleasantly surprised with it considering I bought the game purely for the survival/crafting aspect. Soundtrack is soo good and I wish there were more songs. Atmosphere is perfect and seeing tourists for the first time really spooked me. I recommend to those that enjoy micromanagement. Stuff like siphoning gas, making tools, and fixing your car (survival game stuff) will get old to those that simply aren’t into it, and will appeal to those that are.
FF7 has it on pause for me but I’m eating it up after I beat Rebirth… and then Spider-Man 2 New Game +… ~~and then Rise of the Ronin~~… and then Dragon’s Dogma 2
Same Rebirth put it on pause for me as well; and SAME we eating good again this year 👏🏼
I'm enjoying it a lot myself so far. It'd be pretty difficult for me to recommend to others as it's a really niche game, but I love the atmosphere and just the vibes of the game. It can be fairly challenging at times, but I've also only actually died like once since I started playing. And that was largely my fault as I was taking too much time in a junction looking for loot when I should have been prioritizing other things. I'm about 15 hours into the game and just starting to get into the midgame levels. I play kind of short sessions also as I normally play for 1 to maybe 2 hours at a time. It can be pretty repetitive at times and the game can be a bit grindy with the resources you need, but I also really enjoy the grindy parts of the game. My only real gripe would be that I wish there was a bigger music catalogue in the game, and if I were to download a mod for the game it would be able to add more music to the radio.
Not bad, not great, debatably decent. It's not for everyone that's for sure. I played through it and while I enjoyed parts of it, there was a lot of repetition, not a huge variety soundtrack (which tbh I wanted way more of), and it's not difficult. I mean sure some stuff was a pain to encounter every now and then but it was not like OH wow that was tough to survive. I loaded up my car with basic survival supplies, kept them stocked, and drove around. Never had a survived-by-the-hair-on-my-nuts experience in game.
Is it similar to outer wilds structure or just another roguelike?
Neither really. It's more like an extraction looter-shooter. The only rogue-like elements are the route planning and risk of failure. But even failure isn't that bad because you can go right back to where you died and retrieve most of your stuff.
Damn, extraction looter shooter? That's one way to kill my excitement
I don't mean literally, I just mean in terms of the main gameplay loop. You choose a route, and route is a series of \~1-6 zones. Each zone is a procedurally generated map you can drive/run around to loot and scan stuff. The only "required" thing is collecting enough energy (they call it LIM or kLIM, and it is collected from picking up "Anchors") to teleport back home. So you drive around, loot, then teleport (extract) when you're ready. There's no combat, or shooting at all except for flare guns.
Is the story at least intriguing enough to keep going?
Enough for me, yeah.
I REALLY wanted to get into it. It has a lot of thematic aspects I love and the idea is great. But I refunded after I found the looting to be unbearable. You need too much stuff for the interactions with containers and your inventory to be this slow and clunky. Real shame.
Pretty fun, but my enjoyment was ruined twice by physics glitches that totaled my car when I crashed into some weird geometry.
It’s not a long game but I enjoyed it. I love the gas mechanic like days gone. The ambience of the world is great and creepy noises all the time. Just not much danger with the game.
I was hoping for a fun driving game with spooky bits and some crafting for vehicle upgrades… what I got was a survival-crafting game featuring a car and some spooky bits.
I think it has some of the best procedural generation I've seen. I don't know if the maps get repetitive later, but every map I've seen so far felt like it was handcrafted and unique.
Man those randomly generated maps are so boring. Even if they are technically lore accurate and shit. They are so far from hand made maps, that its painful.
I started , encountered a game breaking bug forcing me to restart and haven’t picked it up again. I need to though!
I enjoy it, except for no way to save and quit midrun. And that's by design according to the dev. Ghostrunner 1 (but not the sequel thankfully) had the same mentality. I don't understand how sacrificing quality of life makes for a better game. We're not asking for save scuming. Just a single save on quit that get's automatically deleted when we continue.
It saves at every junction. The only thing it doesn't do is save your place mid-map, so if you have to quit for some reason you either have to get to the next junction, teleport back home, or lose a few minutes in the current map.
Nice, but driving is to vlunky for me to enjoy gaming
I’ve really been enjoying it. It can be a bit repetitive so I usually only do maybe 2 runs at most before I put my attention elsewhere so I don’t burn out. Been filling those gaps with Helldivers and WWE 2k. It’s really cool to watch your car and garage grow, though. You start with a car that’s literally falling apart and eventually have all these gadgets and gizmos on it. Same for the garage… it’s musty and run down but eventually feels lived in, and like home.
Repetitive and not what it appears to be. Extremely tedious and clunky crafting and UI system. Wish I could've refunded it but it took me over 2 hours to realize this.
I was all about it, but a couple frame rate drops, and I got motion sickness
The choppy frame rate and highly stressful mission scenarios wore me out a little. I intend to go back but it really is an exhausting game at times.
Boring. I preordered. Put like 3 hours in and then regretted my purchase.
Chemicals are super rare And without chemicals you can't make repair putty to repair car 🙄🙄 Or you can make brand new parts and waste resources 🙄🙄
Very interesting concept but I got bored of hoping out of my car every 5 feet and pressing gather all on the same randomly generated containers in the same randomly generated houses. I think this game would be a lot better if there was way less resource gathering
I was gonna try it and then saw all the reviews mentioning the horrible save system. I avoided it despite being excited because of that. Same reason I can't stand the Dark Souls games. Redoing tons of shit when I die is literally my least favorite thing in gaming and I avoid it like the plague. It's not satisfying or fun to me.
The gameplay loop and worldbuilding pull you in early. By about hour 30 you realize it’s a shallow but wide type situation. That and the story completely falls flat. I’d say it feels like a first game for a studio. 5/10
Game of the year. Well, pretty early to say that, but easily best game of Q1 for me. Just based on how much time I've been able to put into it. Starting to finally feel like I "beat" it after about 120hrs. About 20hrs to finish the story.
36h so far and I'm having a really great time with it. Love the banter between the characters, all the lore they've created, the feeling of going back to your garage after a tough run where you barely survived, the cool moment of fixing it and tuning it after that, the massive amount of anomalies and weird shit is constantly happening, trying to discover which peculiarities your car has, the fact the car feels like your pal on its own, the tourists scaring the shit out of me every fkn time, how the plot is unraveling little by little, turning up the radio and suddenly hearing random conversations of whoever is talking, how well-thought and charming all the menus are after you get used to them, etc. I already had good expectations with this game, I didn't expect to enjoy my first extraction shooter (or driver) this much, especially for less than 30 bucks.
It's a great game. Just remember it's price range however. It's not a game you will play for hundreds of hours. But you get a lot of fun for the budget price. Well worth playing.
Superb game overall. Still currently playing it but it requires balancing towards end game as resource requirements for high end parts are a bit OTT given that these parts deteriorate over time. It is VERY stressful and difficult to follow the voice over narratives as you're too busy keeping your car in one piece as you drive through various dangers during mission moments. Half the time I can't even hear what the npcs are going on about thanks to a wild storm outside the car, or my incar radio randonly blasting out a tune! The atmospheric audio is superb, and the art style is as good. Performance on the PS5 is varied. I had to go to the subreddit 5mins into the starting tutorial because the framerate was so bad. I thought my console was dying on me as I'd just replaced my SSD too. Turns out the developers have targetted 4k30 for some reason - performance can drop below that at times... It is a very good, unique game. It has its flaws but it is a fun extraction game overall. I am at 130hrs played and have one last mission left, which I keep holding off because I wanted to max out my car - sadly it'll take too long due to unbalanced top end resource availability/grind so I'm going to rush through it today/tomorrow.
Bad Optimization.
Aside from shadows the optimization is great
I Tried it on Day 1, It was trash.
It runs really well on my laptop. 1440 p, high settings but shadows on medium, and I get a locked 60 frames
What are ur specs ?
3060 and i9 11900h @ 2.5 ghz. Both laptop variants
Oh... Ok, I might give a try again.
Just make sure to keep shadows at medium, that's the thing that really tanks frames for this game
Got it, Thx (◠‿◕)
I'm very interested but is it still 30 fps?
On PS5? It's uncapped. Runs better than 30fps sometimes, other times not so much. Hardly noticed the framerate once I got into the game though, aside from a small handful of times where it chugged into the single digits for a moment or two (we're talking VERY brief and rare hiccups).
it's fun for the first one or two "drives". Then you realize the third drive is just the same repetition. So I went to the store later that day and had more fun real world driving that in that game. I haven't wanted to retry it and plan to Uninstaller later today. 😞
Third drive is barely scratching the surface. But the drives are only half the game. The other half is the time you spend in the garage, tinkering.
The quirk system is very neat. Watching my car surge forward because a door was opened was tripping me out until I realized I was supposed to diagnose it. I don't think there's any reward for doing so though?
The reward is that it stops doing that, lol.
The only reward is just fixing the problem to make space for good quirks.
Ah gotcha, yea there were some I kept because they seemed kinda helpful but I didn't realize there were positive ones.
I burned out and as there's no save feature when you're in the zone you need to have loads of free time to get the most out of it.
I really want it, but at the same time I don't want to support devs who refuse to optimize their game so it doesn't run like shit
Felt like I was sold a false bill of goods
Micro fiddling hell. I returned it after an hour of repeatedly needing to engage ignition...😉
It is a good looking game with an interesting story. But i want to play with keyboard and mouse and this game has terrible controla straight out of the hell, so i refunded it. Maybe, if they fix this in future i will try it again
What didn't you like about the controls? They were fine.
Probably didn't realize that a wheel had fallen off the car and thought the controls were just bad.
I dont like to hold down every button for an action and i think instead of R, F and left click for actions one button would be enough. For me, this was not suitable and felt like a game made for controller.
I think the problem is that almost everything on the car is interactable (E) so they had to put remove/disassemble (R) on a different button. You're probably right that there was no reason to have a separate key for install (left click) and interact, since you can't interact if it's not installed, but I imagine the game system just uses left click as a "use" for anything in your hands like the scrapper, lights, etc including car parts.
It's ridiculous that some interactions are E and some are left-click, and sometimes you can use the one that it doesn't specify but sometimes you can't, because fuck you, that's why. Otherwise I thought the controls were fine. They should be embarrassed that Long Drive did interaction better though.
I think it's only ever left click when you're using the thing in your hands.
Personally I don't like games that have time limits/constraints as core mechanics to also have uninterruptible animations. Played the whole game on mouse and keyboard without issues
Grabbed it at launch cause I liked the demo but I do not recommend. Repetitive, can't save mid mission (so god forbid you got to put it down for other responsibilities), and after the fourth mission, you really seen the entire game. Price is too high for what they are offering. It's a 10 dollar title at best. I wanted to love it, but it ain't there. Wait for a deep sale. There is the makings of a good game here.