Developer: Insomniac Games
Publisher: Microsoft Studios
Platform: Xbox One
Tested on: Xbox One
Sunset Overdrive – Review
The art of taking yourself not too seriously, certainly something that is not as easy as it sounds. Sunset Overdrive however, takes a trip down this road and does a fairly good job in succeeding. This exclusive surely has a decent amount of potential to convince gamers into trying a game that does not connect to titles that are considered popular nowadays. Colorful carnage, here we come.
Story
You, the typical cliché of a nobody, has the important task of picking up trash at a local concert. As always you despise the job and you feel like your life is quite meaningless. You’re sick of picking up cans of the new popular soda brand, FIZZCO, so you decide to take a break. When suddenly a random partygoer decides to come close, vomiting as if his life depends on it you think you have reached a new low. When it seems, his life truly depended on it and he transforms into a hideous mutant, you know something is wrong (duh!). When more and more people are turning into mutants you decide to flee the scene and go back to your place.
When going home it seems the entire city has turned into mutants and you think FIZZCO is to blame. You decide to bunker it out in your apartment, with the necessary supplies of beer and snacks. Sadly, this disaster seems to last a tad longer than you could have imagined and thus you need to go out to find some more supplies again. Oh – and the mutants at your doorstep are an extra motivation to get out there and explore. Soon when coming outside, you meet the grumpy Walter, who lets you fend for yourself, to see what you are able to do. After surviving the vicious attack he decides to inform you on how the city transformed and he’ll take you to one of the last ‘fortresses’ of those who have not transformed yet. This is pretty much where your unlikely adventure begins.
Whilst the story is brought with a very humorous undertone, it feels less strong than you’d want it to be. Even with the light theme, you will notice that the story proceeds quite loosely and is not as gripping as you’d want it to be. That being said, the overall storyline is still quite decent, amusing and it will keep you entertained.
Graphics
Goodbye realism, hello flashy colors, weird mutants and teddy bear grenade throwers. Sunset Overdrive tries to go for a totally different style, other than most realistic or grim games nowadays. Everything in the city will be light, flashy and full of colors. You’ll either love this theme or hate it. Either way, it will take a short amount of time of getting used to it.
Overall the environments offer enough diversity to keep you interested for quite some while, but certain items are overused or look exactly the same, on totally different places. A small detail but it’s sad that this colorful world shows signs of certain copy-paste elements.
A small hiccup in the overall design is that your main character, when grinding, is able to move through a lot of static objects. Most of the time it’s just his feet that go through certain objects or his grappling hook that moves through poles or cables, it should not move through. Again a small detail but a noticeable one.
Sound
Witty seems to be the keyword for the overall voice acting. Pun after pun, silly remarks and overall crummy trash talk will make a grin appear on your face a lot during your playthrough and this makes the game interesting. You’ll wonder what the next conversation will be about and it also contributes to the overall character development.
Music wise, Sunset Overdrive proves to be a game that gets you in the right mood to kick some mutant butt. You’ll constantly hear a ‘rock-ish’ soundtrack, in order to get your blood pumping a tad more than normally and you’ll notice that the movie keeps you going.
Gameplay
Sunset Overdrive is an action packed sandbox game at its core and simply that already proves to keep you occupied for quite some time. Loads of missions, nooks and crannies to explore and above all mutants, FIZZCO robots and a lot of other baddies to defeat.
Combine the grinding and tricks of the old school Jet Set Radio with the freerunning skills from Assassin’s Creed and the map of GTA and a paint can with fluorescent paint and you’ll probably end up with something that looks and plays just like Sunset Overdrive. From the beginning to the ending you’ll have to learn how to move around the city, without having to walk too much. You’ll learn how to grind, climb, jump, bounce and so on, in order to prevent getting hit or seen by enemies.
Of course you’ll have enough missions to complete during your evasive, cool looking actions. When completing missions you’ll be rewarded with cash, energy, materials and weapons. All of these items can be put to good use. Cash will earn you cosmetic changes, whilst energy will give you the chance to buy more weapons. Materials can be used for ‘amps’ and weapons speak for themselves.
Amps – are pretty much the same as upgrades/effects that get triggered when your combo meter has enough power. These amps can differ from doing damage when you dodge, shoot fireballs when using melee attacks or adding special effects to your items. Your combo meter has to be filled by using tricks or killing enemies. Last but not least, the amps themselves can either be rewards but a lot of them have to be cooked in town. When cooking the amps, you’ll have to defend the vats from the mutants in order to get your prized reward(s). Luckily, you’ll be able to place some traps in order to assist you.
Except for amps, you’ll also have ‘overdrives’. These overdrives can be seen as passive skills that either fill up your combo meter faster, allow you to have more ammo and so on. You’ll be able to buy extra overdrives with badges you earn. Badges can be earned by doing pretty much anything actually, going from jumping a lot, grinding all over the place to destroying your enemies with your favorite weapons.
Your weapon arsenal in the game is quite vast. You’ll be able to collect a decent amount of weapons and most of them will be quite absurd. Shooting little helicopters with guns attached to them and a teddy bear grenade launcher will surely make you smile. When using your weapons a lot, they will level up. When leveled up, you’ll be allowed to equip amps.
It takes some time getting used to the controls, not only the movement controls but also the fighting options. You’ll notice it’s not that easy to fight when you’re always on the move. After a while you’ll find the weapons that suit you best and you’ll learn more and more moves to move your characters around. Most of these extra moves make it easier to move around a lot. Overall a very responsive control scheme but it takes time getting used to.
Challenges and many collectibles are spread across the map to keep you occupied for a lot longer. These collectibles will allow you to create even more amps.
Multiplayer in Sunset Overdrive is simply great. You’ll be able to play with seven other players in the Chaos Squad mode which will present you with several smaller missions, that will build up to a nighttime defense, in which you’ll have to defends the vats again. The fun part, except for wreaking havoc with seven other players, is being able to earn rewards you can use in your single player game. You can earn weapons, amps, cosmetic items and so on, in order to boost your single player campaign.
Conclusion
Sunset Overdrive proves to be a great exclusive title for the Xbox One. In certain ways it feels like a colorful brother of Dead Rising 3, with a lot of twists and turns of its own. You’ll be able to spend a lot of time in the Sunset Overdrive world, performing cool tricks and killing baddies. Heroes-to-be, pack your bags and go kick some FIZZCO butt.
Sunset Overdrive - Review,
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