Road 96: Mile 0

[h3]• Road 96 ? Non pas vraiment…[/h3] Si vous lancez Road 96: Mile 0 en espérant retrouver la magie du premier opus, le choc risque d’être brutal. Oubliez le road trip, les rencontres imprévisibles et cette sensation de liberté : ici, on est davantage face à un préquel narratif ponctué de phases de skate et de rollers en rythme et d’esquives d’obstacles… un choix plutôt déroutant. Le jeu n’est pas mauvais en soi. Il développe un peu l’univers, approfondit certains personnages et sa direction artistique reste colorée et agréable. Mais les séquences musicales, aussi originales soient-elles, cassent souvent le rythme et finissent par devenir plus lassantes qu’amusantes. Quant à l’exploration, elle paraît bien plus linéaire et perd ce qui faisait tout le charme de Road 96. Pris comme une expérience indépendante, ça se laisse jouer. Pris comme la suite d’un jeu aussi marquant que le premier opus… la déception est difficile à éviter. [h3]⤷ En conclusion : [/h3] Road 96: Mile 0 n’est pas un mauvais jeu, mais une mauvaise suite, c’est indéniable. Si vous l’abordez comme un spin-off un peu expérimental, vous pourrez passer un bon moment. Si vous attendez un nouveau Road 96, préparez-vous à freiner des quatre roues ! Je recommande… mais uniquement si vous laissez vos attentes au vestiaire.

To me this game feels like the product of a studio receiving a higher budget, but being forced to make a sequel. I felt that the first game had pretty much explored the height of this concept, but Mile 0 takes a step back. The illusion of freedom given in the first game was executed much better, while here it is much more confined and linear. While the world is far more detailed, the graphical appearance isn't remarkably improved. The voice acting still has a cheesy, amateur quality, and the soundtrack doesn't resonate as strongly. There are still moments of charm throughout, but more often the experience feels stiff. It confuses me how prevalent the "rhythm" sections are in the game despite not being heavily advertised. They really don't require any skill, and there's no incentive to trying again if you get a low score. It disjoints the narrative experience greatly and feels more like an unskipable cutscene. If you're a diehard fan of the original and its world building, I'm sure these things won't ruin your experience and it would be worth checking out. However, if you more so appreciated the atmosphere and gameplay, I would recommend skipping this title.

A game made by Tyrak! So I was a big fan of the first Road 96 game as I love its world, characters and story but also its gameplay being an interesting blend of rogue-like, choices and immersive sim elements. I had heard the prequel wasn’t very good with mixed reviews but I wanted to play it and form my own opinion. And I’m not going to even bother with a “What did I think?” question, because I honestly hated this experience. To talk about some of the things I do like first, the visuals for this game are once again really well done. The game is made in the unity engine but the game just has a great artstyle with character models that look like they are from the PS1 era but have just enough detail and modern enhancements. And also the ride segments (which I have a lot to say on later) look downright artistic and basically like flashy music videos. The soundtrack is not as good as the first but still a decent OST. And I also liked some of the comedic moments in the story. One of my favorite characters from the first game was Sonya, the trashy news reporter and her limo driver, Adam. Well in this game you get to see how they meet and those segments had me laughing out loud. But ya, the rest of this package I didn’t like at all so let's talk about that. Firstly this game ditches the rogue-like elements and instead goes for a few hand crafted areas since this game takes place in the city of White Sands. That would be fine but I mean there are basically only 4 areas you explore: Zoe and Kaito’s hideout which is basically your hub area and then 3 city areas you go to for story sections. The issue is these city areas are really small and outside of searching trash bins for collectables and defiling or honoring propaganda posters, there's really not that much to do in them other than talk to a few NPCs. And ya man I know this is made by an indie team but they really could have done a lot more with this framework. Another issue is when you travel in between these areas you have to sit through these fairly long loading screens which aren’t the longest ones I’ve sat through, but still like bro why? These areas are so small and you can barely do anything in them anyway. What is this a Bethesda game? At least in those games the long loading screens lead to big explorable areas. Then we have the ride segments which basically transition you from level to level as you complete story segments. These are basically like Sonic the Hedgehog levels where you ride super fast, collecting points and avoiding hazards. Like I said before, these segments do look very nice with the visuals but gameplay wise they're terrible. A lot of cheap deaths to make you redo sections and they're just not what I wanted when playing a new game from this developer. I talked in my Pathfinder WOTR review about how devs have these gameplay segments that differ from the main loop to break up the tedium but all they do is annoy the player. Same thing here but this game is just filled with mini-games that you have to complete to progress. In a way it's similar to a game like Mixtape, which I have not played, but from what I’ve seen in gameplay and reviews is that it has the same structure, of a little bit of story + bare bones gameplay + ride segments that are basically just glorified music videos. And I’m just not for it. [b] SPOILERS AHEAD FOR THE STORY. IF YOU DON’T WANT TO BE SPOILED, SKIPPED THE TO LAST PARAGRAPH. [/b] Then we have the story which I honestly didn’t like either. It starts out as a simple prequel as we play as Zoe from the first game and her friend Kaito who is new to the series. Since it’s a prequel this game basically serves as the explanation as to why Zoe left her home and family for the road to escape the border. This is illustrated in the fact that Zoe’s father is the Minister of oil so she’s rich while Kaito and his family are part of the working class and are constantly being harassed by the police for being Brigade sympathizers. The game is split into 3 acts with the first act having you play as Zoe, second act Kaito and then the finale a combination of the two. This would all be fine if the writing was at all decent which it isn’t. Much of the choices either boil down to 2 sides. For Zoe it’s believing in her country and Tyrak, or realizing how corrupt the government is and for Kaito it's either being for the Brigades or realizing how corrupt they are too. Not much on the choice side to be honest because if you’ve played the first game you already know the answers to these questions and it's all just very black and white. No morally grey choices like in the first game. But anyway the end goal is for Kaito to grab a file from Tyrak’s palace to give to the Brigades so that he and his family can escape. He spends the whole game trying to convince Zoe that she shouldn’t trust the government and she eventually agrees to help him only for him to bail on her as soon as he gets the file. The explanation he gives is if she came with them they would never be safe because her father would hunt them down to get her back. Understandable from a certain angle but he’s still a jerk for using her. So Zoe goes after Kaito in a really drawn out final chapter. Kaito goes to the Brigades only for the leader to hold a gun to his family and be like “give me the file or else” so when Kaito goes to get the file Zoe is there. And this is where the writing really killed it for me. You can position the choices to either Zoe wanting to help Kaito or get revenge. My choices went down the revenge path but it just felt so poorly written and like forced drama. They argue and then there’s a final boss fight where you pick either Kaito or Zoe and have a fighting game segment (yes I’m not joking) only it's not really a fighting game since all the punches and kicks are QTEs, another lovely mechanic in games. That was sarcasm btw. The devs really were sniffing their own farts here because while it once again looks cool from an artistic standpoint, it’s just so freaking stupid from a narrative sense. Anyway Zoe wins the fight and she goes off on her journey while Kaito is left with a psychopath. I really did think they all were going to die right there but the leader changes his mind and leaves for no reason other than to have an ending that didn’t make people mad (I’m still mad). Utterly and creatively bankrupt. So ya overall, I don’t recommend this game. While I was interested in the idea of a game that expanded on Zoe’s character, they sacrificed too much to make it happen and replaced much of the gameplay with mini-game sections that should be optional but you're forced to complete in order to progress. The writing also fails for me in every way and all it did was piss me off.

While I really like the game, I can understand the mixed reviews. It's pretty compact and has fewer choices that impact the story significantly compared to the previous game. Speaking of the the original, do NOT go into this game thinking it'll be like Road 96. It's very different gameplay-wise and also shorter. Definetly only get this on sale.

Не рекомендую Как же я разочарован. Оригинальная Road 96 была для меня чем-то особенным — атмосфера дороги, свобода выбора, случайные встречи, дух приключения. Mile 0 же растеряла всё это по пути. 1. Прощай, дорога. Здравствуй, линейность. Игра потеряла то, за что я полюбил первую часть: ощущение свободы и путешествия. Вместо этого мы получили камерный, скучный и почти полностью линейный сюжет. Ты уже не безымянный путешественник, пробирающийся к границе, а участник заранее заданного маршрута. Вся магия Road 96 куда-то исчезла . 2. Геймплей — это теперь «Subway Surfers». Я не шучу. Около половины игрового времени занимает бег на скейте с прыжками и уворотами от препятствий. Напоминает дешёвую мобильную игру. Камера в этих сегментах просто ужасна: иногда она встаёт под таким углом, что ты физически не видишь, куда нужно ехать. Хитбоксы сломаны — я постоянно врезаюсь в препятствия, которые, казалось бы, обошёл . Это не «инновационная механика», а дешёвая набивка хронометража. Похоже, разработчики решили, что на одном сюжете далеко не уедешь, и добавили «раннер» лишь бы что-то было . 3. Сценарий уровня фанфика. Диалоги настолько плоские и глупые, что у меня разболелась голова . Персонажи ведут себя нелогично: Кайто первую половину игры ведёт себя как навязчивый маньяк, но сюжет этого будто не замечает. А его предательство в конце — самая глупая сцена, какую я видел. Ему достаточно было подождать тридцать секунд . Политическая сатира, которая в первой части была глубокой и грустной, здесь превратилась в карикатуру. Всё подаётся слишком прямолинейно, как в плохом подростковом фильме про «революцию» . 4. Бессмысленный выбор. В первой части выбор имел последствия. Здесь же система выбора сведена к минимуму. Большинство решений ни на что не влияют, кроме пары сменяющих друг друга концовок. Например, игра может упрекнуть тебя в том, что ты «предал революцию», просто спросив о безопасности своих родителей. Бред . Итог: Если вы ждали духа Road 96 — проходите мимо. Это не просто слабое продолжение, это совершенно другая, намного худшая игра. Разработчики пытались сделать что-то «смелое и новое», но в итоге выдали пережёванный продукт с дешёвым геймплеем и слабым сюжетом. Единственное, что ещё тянет игру на троечку — это пара саундтреков и приятная рисовка, но и они не спасают положение . Лучше перепройдите первую часть. А эту я не рекомендую даже со скидкой .

So disappointing! Not gonna lie, I had kind of high hopes for this and I didn't even let the bad reviews scare me off. But boy oh boy, I should have listened... This game does have its moments, when it focusses on the things that Road 96 did right. In the slow parts, the parts where we get to know our characters and have them interact. The highlight of the game is the roof top scene by far. Unfortunately the main gameplay part is actually these pesky so called rides, a wild mixture of rythm game and QTEs. The controls in these rides are unresponsive and you tend to jump or turn way too late, because it feels like ages till the character moves. On the other hand the QTEs are completely opposite. When you feel like pressing it at the right time, it always just says "good". When you press way too late it says "perfect". There is something seriously wrong with the timings in this game. The rides themselves are also extremely badly designed. You have forced perspective changes that makes it almost impossible to see where you are going or where your obstacles or diamonds (the things you need to collect) are. Last but not least the points you get for the rides feel completely arbitrary. I literally had a ride where I died only once, collected all extra thingies and still only got a B. In other rides, I died several times and still got an A. Last but not least the rides completely break the immersion and when I am in the story I don't want to do these rides, I just want to make the decisions. When I later replay those rides to get achievements, I don't want to do the story parts, I don't care about the decisions, because I am only there for the achievements. Whoever had the idea to make this game this kind of mashup should seriously reconsider their carreer choices. This is really an absolute trainwreck that could have been a great game if they simply sticked to the formula of Road 96...

game pretty much expands the story of the original game and helps connect the dots, which is really nice. i also suggest playing the original first. even though Mile 0 is a prequel, I still think its better experienced after the first game since the connections and character moments hit much harder. really cool game. 8/10