Pressure Overdrive Reviews

  • FullMoonBeaverFullMoonBeaver1,688,876
    01 Aug 2017
    4 2 0
    Pressure Overdrive Review
    Developed & Published by: Chasing Carrots
    Release Date: 26th July
    Price: £10.39

    Pressure Overdrive arrives on consoles, bringing us gamers with a Steampunk themed twin stick shooter/racer hybrid from Developer Chasing Carrots. An unusual mix of genres I can't say I've played before, and was apprehensive as to whether or not it could work. Fortunately, the controls are responsive enough, and gives the game a pick up and play feel. But as a product, is it worth your money and time?

    Regrettably, it's not the best game, but it's not the worst either. I was looking forward to getting stuck in, as the mere mention of Steampunk makes me pay attention. Not too dissimilar from a meerkat when it's stood on its hind legs when something catches it's attention. That's not to say I was disappointed with the awful Steampunk title Damnation, but I did feel slightly deflated with my experience.

    Pressure Overdrive consists of 33 levels, with a boss fight every 10 levels, with each group of 10 offering a different theme. A country side, a castle interior/exterior and finally a cave system. Tracks are a point A to B affair, with no circuit racing involved. Tracks offer little in variation of their looks and layout. Some bottlenecks, turns aplenty, jumps and copious amounts of AI drivers intent on stopping you in your tracks.

    As for the story, a villain is your target to defeat with your site protagonist. It was hard to feel anything towards your hero, or against the villain either, and just felt like it was slotted in to flesh out the game a bit. I was hoping for a more sinister villain in the guide of Dick Dastardly from the Wacky Races cartoon, but alas this is not the case.

    As for your chariot, you are offered a decent selection of upgrades. With front, rear, top and bottom to give you an extra edge as you progress, improving your vehicle's stats. Weapons and their respective upgrades are obviously included, and the more cash you pump into upgrades the better chance you'll have of finishing a race. Each category has a reasonable amount of upgrade variations on offer for you, and you can even sell them back if you don't like them. Except on Hard, as you have to make do with what you buy.

    Apart from the main campaign, there is Endless mode where you race as normal, but each time you would usually finish a race, you instead reach a pit stop whereby you play a slot machine which offers you a single choice of 4 upgrades to assist you for the next wave. Each wave becomes more challenging, but with it brings more upgrades. Totally pot luck as to what you will get. But if you're not happy with the selection, a small cash expenditure will allow you to roll again. Drop in-out cooperative play is allowed, so if you have a friend around you can both take to the track.

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    The games difficulty levels are broken down into the usual 3 choices of Easy, Normal and Hard. Having played through on Normal, I encountered trouble only once in a later level. But the boss fights up the ante a fair amount, providing a tough encounter. Though once you have figured out the attacks patterns, you won't struggle to much.

    In game power ups are supplied via a large truck which you will need to destroy to pick up said power up which is random in both what it is and when it appears in game. All while you have plenty of enemies to deal with, and bullets to dodge. Needless to say, it can become quite hectic.

    Graphics
    Not too bad in all honesty. Each of the levels look good enough, but unfortunately lack depth and detail. Not even shortcuts and alternative routes one would hope for from a racer of this ilk that could add some flavour to the game.

    Music/FX
    Nothing to shout about here, with subtle ambience favoured instead. Not to say it's a bad thing, but something with more of a tempo than what's on offer would have been preferable.

    Gameplay
    The control scheme would surprisingly well with a twist stick layout, which allows you use of triggers for other functions. May take some getting used too, but soon you will be hurtling along at full speed down each level.

    Replay Value
    Once the short journey through the 33 levels is over, there could be little reason for you to venture back into Pressure Overdrive apart from the Endless mode, and of course achievements. The price is low compared to some other Indie titles, and may tempt you. If you're after all the achievements you will need 3 separate runs through the campaign as difficulty achievements do not stack. So you may end up getting that precious value for money.

    Achievements
    A decent list that asks you a bit of everything. Including using the Love power up for a couple of achievements, beat Wave 20 on Endless and even take no damage for an entire level. Can you face 3 full runs of the same though? Many achievement hunters find this a royal pain in the buttocks, but given how quick you can finish a run it's not the end of the world. As for the difficulty of the list, a bit of hard work will likely net you the lot.

    Summary
    Overall and honestly, I started playing and was enjoying my time with Pressure Overdrive. Looking for that next chunk of cash to afford the next upgrade. But as time went on, I realised that the layout of tracks differed very little from each other and soon fell into a rut as I trudged through each race not noticing much in the way of variation. A shame, as I was looking forward to it, and a lack of meat to the game filled my experience somewhat. Couple that with a silent protagonist that you won't feel anything for as he races towards each boss fight with a villain that lacks a real bad side like some more popular video game villains, and Pressure Overdrive will leave you feeling a bit bored towards the end. To wrap up, it's not a great game that will be your first port of call when on the store, but it's not a terrible game. It functions, and has good visuals and surprisingly good controls.

    A code was supplied for review purposes.
    2.5
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