“Oh man! here we go! wait! where’s the station!…..um……Found it!” The man says to his girlfriend as she rolls her eyes back at him. “Ugh! what am I doing here?” she asks herself jokingly. That’s what I’d like to imagine the man and woman from in the intro to the game Outrun are saying.
Name: Final Freeway | Developer: Oyatsukai | Category: Racing| Players: 1 | Version: 1.5.5.0 | Size: 20 MB | Price: Free / $0.99 |
Well, that, and a whole bunch of other arguments like “Where exactly are we going?” and “Slow down!”, you see where I’m going with this, But keeping on topic. Outrun, a historic landmark in video game history. Developed by Sega and designed by Yu Suzuki (Who’s work includes titles like Hang-on, Space Harrier and After Burner among other things). Outrun is a game that once populated arcades and has spawned multiple spin-offs and was a staple of it’s time. A time when arcades were literally the hottest thing on the block (and by the block, I mean everywhere) and a time when Sega was a more innovative and arguably, more important company. But with the game we’re looking at today, the influences are clear. That game is: Final Freeway.
Developed by Oyatsukai and released for Android and iOS (Also released on the Amazon Appstore for all you Kindle Fire people, they’ve got your back), Final Freeway is a homage/love letter to driving games of that era and Outrun itself. One of the reasons that people found Outrun to be so addictive, was its gameplay and thankfully, the transition from the arcade, to the mobile-experience has left the gameplay intact. It’s still addictive.
(But before we start, there is one additional category that I’ll be rating the game on. It’s something that is equally as important as the contents of the game itself, The icon! The Icon is something that really only applies to software. The Icon of the game is what initially catches your eye and I’ll be adding it into my reviews from now on.)
On the topic of presentation, Oyatsukai holds all of their games to a high standard and with Final Freeway, it’s immediately obvious. Though it doesn’t have an awesome little start animation like Outrun, Final Freeway just looks like a lot of fun and it just feels inviting. Upon starting the application, you are greeted by a quick flash of Oyatsukai’s logo and then you are brought to the main menu. Now, in the main menu you are greeted by three main choices Play Game, High Scores and Options. Oh, and there’s a demo animation that plays every couple seconds and displays your high-scores. It’s a minor annoyance (Because my phone isn’t an arcade machine), but at least it’s accurate, right?
Final Freeway isn’t completely an 8-bit/16-bit/32-bit game, the in-game items like the cars, people and trees aren’t drawn sprites, they are pictures of actual objects, digital-ized? and are made to look blocky and lower resolution. It’s an interesting looking effect and it reminds me of the original Mortal Kombat, in a way. While driving though, the scenery looks really cool, it’s like if the world is rolling out ahead of you as you drive and I really like the way it looks as you turn corners and go up and down hills. It all feels really fast, and that’s a good thing.
By default the game is controlled by the accelerometer and two on-screen buttons, but thankfully, there are multiple control options for you to choose from. Sadly, none of these options ever actually felt good when playing and in two cases the control arrows locked up, causing me to fail in my attempt to beat my high score. It’s a legitimate disappointment and I hope you can find an option that suits your play style.
On a happier note, I actually like the music in Final Freeway! it’s fun and catchy, you’ll definitely find some favorites here. Though there are only three tracks available, they are all really well done. My favorite track titled “Smooth Ride” was stuck in my head for so long that I found myself just sitting in the menu listening to it, over and over. (I was listening to it while writing this review!)
Sadly the icon for Final Freeway is not as good looking as the game itself and it sticks out like a sore thumb, on your screen. The icon itself is just a square with a picture of a car, a lady under an umbrella and the text “Final Freeway” or “FF”. It’s obvious that not as much time went into the icon, it’s a minor gripe, but it is still annoying. A bad icon is like bad boxart, it doesn’t leave the best first impression.
So in conclusion, Final Freeway is a good game with some big problems that got in the way for me. If you can get over the control issues and love retro driving games (Like me), then this game is for you. There is a free version and a paid version. The free version has ads and the paid version removes those ads, and for 99c it’s worth it.
