I’m playing Road 96 this week, which is on sale for cheap currently and I’ve been curious about for a while.
I should save the full review for after I’ve seen the ending, but it’s definitely an interesting game. The perspective of how the story is told is very unique - there is no protagonist or main character. In fact, it’s almost like a “story roguelite”. You play in multiple individual “runs”, where in each run you play as a nameless and faceless teenager trying to get to the border of the fictional dictatorship Petria and escape the country through Road 96. You even unlock abilities during some events that you can use in any future run, to further the whole roguelite feel.
During each of the runs, you come across a set of characters, and a large part of the story is their stories, told through the eyes of all these nameless teens you play as as you continuously come across these same characters at random points during your journeys.
The other story is the fate of the nation, and this is where the Telltale-style choices-matter stuff comes in. There are three types of dialogue you can pick, either promoting revolution, peaceful change through voting or just ignoring everything and fleeing the country. I’m assuming the ending you get will be influenced by which of these you pick the most times. I’m interested to see what the endings are like, especially regarding how they’re handling revolution/voting.
Overall it’s a bit of a weird one because I like some of the things it’s doing and it has a charm to it, but I also a lot of the time can’t help but think “man, I wish this game was just a little better”. Like, the story concept seems fine but the writing isn’t great. The voice acting is pretty poor, and it’s not that well recorded either. Some of the political stuff and the story looks like it lacks nuance. It seems like the product of a team with a lot of interesting ideas, but not necessarily the skill or budget to execute them.
But eh, for a couple of dollars I am not going to complain too much. And it does have a charm to it.
I’m playing Road 96 this week, which is on sale for cheap currently and I’ve been curious about for a while.
I should save the full review for after I’ve seen the ending, but it’s definitely an interesting game. The perspective of how the story is told is very unique - there is no protagonist or main character. In fact, it’s almost like a “story roguelite”. You play in multiple individual “runs”, where in each run you play as a nameless and faceless teenager trying to get to the border of the fictional dictatorship Petria and escape the country through Road 96. You even unlock abilities during some events that you can use in any future run, to further the whole roguelite feel.
During each of the runs, you come across a set of characters, and a large part of the story is their stories, told through the eyes of all these nameless teens you play as as you continuously come across these same characters at random points during your journeys.
The other story is the fate of the nation, and this is where the Telltale-style choices-matter stuff comes in. There are three types of dialogue you can pick, either promoting revolution, peaceful change through voting or just ignoring everything and fleeing the country. I’m assuming the ending you get will be influenced by which of these you pick the most times. I’m interested to see what the endings are like, especially regarding how they’re handling revolution/voting.
Overall it’s a bit of a weird one because I like some of the things it’s doing and it has a charm to it, but I also a lot of the time can’t help but think “man, I wish this game was just a little better”. Like, the story concept seems fine but the writing isn’t great. The voice acting is pretty poor, and it’s not that well recorded either. Some of the political stuff and the story looks like it lacks nuance. It seems like the product of a team with a lot of interesting ideas, but not necessarily the skill or budget to execute them.
But eh, for a couple of dollars I am not going to complain too much. And it does have a charm to it.