Why Bus Bound For PlayStation 5 Will Make You Hate Public Transport

Starting a brand new transport empire from scratch is a massive undertaking that balances zen-like driving with absolute, high-stakes chaos. Bus Bound thrusts you right into the captain’s seat of a detailed, sprawling world where keeping a schedule is just as vital as keeping your passengers alive. It is an atmospheric experience that manages to be an incredibly therapeutic one minute and deeply, brutally frustrating the next. If you think driving a massive public transit vehicle through tight city lines sounds easy, this experience is ready to violently snap you back to reality.

[Specs] [Gameplay] [Performance] [Settings]

Bus Bound PlayStation 5 Review: Specs & HUD

• Download Size: Clocking in at a very manageable 49.53GB on the SSD.
• Trophy Support: Includes a full Platinum trophy list for the completionists out there.
• Camera Flexibility: Features a full 3D game world with the ability to instantly swap between first and third-person views with a simple click of a button.
• HUD Clarity: I appreciate and like how simple the HUD is; it shows shortcut commands for your basics, it is not cluttered or overwhelming, and the speedo always shows the speed limit while flashing red when you go over.
• Schedule Tracker: Time is just as important as safety, and when leaving a stop, you will have a time on the screen that shows green for on time, and red for behind schedule, along with the exact time you are supposed to hit the next bus stop on your route.
• Navigation Aids: Road markings outside of the location are red and green and point you in the right direction, though the arrows showing you where to go show through walls and cars, and that can cause issues.

Gameplay Review & Mechanics Breakdown

The way they break you in is slow but methodical, and most importantly, it is broken down, starting with an opening tutorial segment and useful tutorial pop-ups as you play. You will have the option to name your bus company, navigating a world map level select that lets you jump around and take in different routes and locations. Driving-wise, you are required to drive well, and you can open and close doors, but thankfully, passengers don’t pay for tickets, so you don’t have to worry about that. You use indicators for turning and changing lanes, but what is cool is when you turn ’em on, you get a pop-up of that side mirror helping you see traffic before turning, and they turn off automatically as you do the turn. Over time, you unlock more controls, and you can do things like set the speed to a certain speed limit or have it uncapped, and you can use your horn and windscreen wipers.

Play how you want and take in lines you want to, because it’s more than just a Sim game; you can get adventure game levels of unlocks and discovery, as not all routes are open or found as you are starting a whole new company. You are always working towards happy customers, and they are green thumbs up icons, and as you collect them, you get gold stars, which in turn unlock new routes, line extensions, customisation options, and buses. There are 19 buses to unlock and use, and each handles differently, plus every line will have a completion percentage on it, and each bus has its own list of objectives you can work on for rewards and unlocks shown beforehand. You can customise your bus in the garage at the depot to use newly unlocked colours and decals for free, or just take a breather using the free roam option in the depot, so you can just go out and do what you want. The map is split up into districts, and earning gold stars for each route in a district will then upgrade that district, which changes the road surfaces, adds or changes landmarks and generally makes a difference, and you can even jump into an online multiplayer mode.

As you drive around on routes and take on passengers, you get a 1 to 3 star rating for pulling up and stopping at the bus stops, along with your general safety of passengers. Customers will give real time feedback and yes it’s good to know how you are doing but some of these people are self entitled little bar stewards, and there is no Ma’am would you please leave the bus, you are disturbing the passengers option. Many hazards can happen, such as breakdowns or bad drivers, which add a touch of realism to it all, but a rogue AI or glitch rips you straight back to reality. It’s a game that can be relaxing but also frustrating, as sometimes one small slip is enough to ruin a run or a rogue AI car hitting you, and you getting penalised is next-level frustrating. I did find at times it could be hard to judge when a stop was coming up, as you don’t get a lot of visual feedback, cornering is a mixed bag, and some of the road signs and roads you merge into are not easy to read or gauge safety.

Bus Bound PlayStation 5 Review: Performance & Fidelity

• Visual Quality: Features excellent graphics with a very detailed location that has some awesome places to visit.
• Traffic Detail: The traffic is also very detailed; you can easily read number plates and even see specific stickers and graphics on surrounding cars.
• Framerate & Stability: The performance is not always solid; slowdown and chugging can occur, vehicles in the mirrors look worse and look slowed down, and pop-in and pop-up textures and traffic can happen from time to time.
• Audio Experience: Music-wise, you have a radio in the cab you can’t tinker with, otherwise it’s just engine noise and the real world sounds.
• Cinematics: In-game cutscenes and character interactions feature great voice work, and you can skip and fast forward them if you want to get moving.
• Audio Bug: Had a weird bug where pausing the game and then going into settings would then play a loud engine noise until you unpause it.

Settings, Customisation & Control Details

• Graphic Toggles: Video settings include a brightness slider, graphic presets for quality and performance, motion blur, and chromatic aberration toggles.
• Accessibility Suite: Includes colour adjustment, colour adjustment intensity, subtitle text size, and passenger reactions, where you can toggle whether you see good only, bad only, all, or none.
• Wheel Integration: Steering wheel support is fully featured with a dedicated menu for tweaking Deadzone, sensitivity sliders, remapping controls, and adjusting force feedback intensity.
• Peripherals: Full mouse and keyboard support is present, allowing you to remap the controls and adjust a sensitivity slider for the mouse.
• DualSense Configuration: You can remap the controller and tweak sensitivity sliders, though on the controller, you don’t get as much to mess around with as you do with the wheel or keyboard, and the brakes don’t always feel good.
• General Gameplay Sliders: Includes brake/throttle/and steering linearity sliders, a field of view slider for both third and first-person views, a haptic feedback slider, and invert axis alongside sensitivity sliders for the camera.
• Route Mechanics: When in a route that involves you turning around and coming back on yourself, you can manually set it to be a manual or automatic process.

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