Review: Retro City Rampage

After what feels like a lifetime of teaser tweets, previews. Retro City Rampage is finally yours to download and play on PS3, 360 and Steam. Unless you’re in PAL territories in which case the wait continues. Looking like a NES game with attitude, RCR brings us a full on explosive nostalgia trip. Run, gun, swim and laugh hysterically to victory! NO SPOILERS are mentioned in the review as you have to discover its charms yourself. It’s the right way.

Pros:

• 8 Bit pixel graphics.
• Chip Tune soundtrack covering drum and bass, techno and many more.
• It’s all about the 80s/90s! covering classic games to films to music, it’s all in there. With so many references you cant help but smile as your memories of yesteryear flood back making you feel all warm and fuzzy.
• Controls are tight, possible to play the game as a twin stick shooter, driving is easy and again you have a choice to play it with or without manual gears. You have a cover system implemented and is easy to use and very effective.
• The PS3 version also nets you the Vita version for FREE. The Vita version isn’t scrimped on either offering touch screen and all the features of the PS3 game.
• Campaign is a huge retro filled, laugh a minute over the top explosion of fun. Well scripted and paced very well it can take hours to go through the campaign alone. Side missions add more spice and longevity.
• Loads of changeable border screens. From a game boy style one that turns your tv into a huge green screen experience, to a old school tv to a classic arcade border. Its all in there and adds so much atmosphere to the game.
• Missions are varied and have a good pacing. Every so often you will come across a mission that will literally kick your ass for days, the key is to just keep at it. Pro Tip: the obvious way may not always be the right way. Think outside the box.
• Customisation is huge in-game, new haircuts, clothes and avatar in-game pics are all your to tinker with and unlock through game play. Most haircuts are from iconic people of the 80s/90s. Usually with hilarious results.
• Online leader boards are available for both your campaign score and also the mini games.
• You can lose cops by either getting a spray job on your motor, starting a mission or by getting out of their line of sight.
• Mini games can be played through a separate option from the main menu or they can be found in-game, without fear of messing up your campaign run through.
• You can save your mini game play through to the HDD and upload it to the leaderboard, allowing you to watch other people’s run through to help improve your game.
•  A free roam mode is an option allowing you to just jump straight in and cruise around, cause mayhem or even find some of the many hidden collectibles.
• Campaign throws up a lot of memories in such ways as re doing classic levels/scenes from games to the scripting.
• You can find cheat codes scattered all over the place. Be warned they disable trophies/achievements and leaderboard.

 

• The police are really easy to trigger. hitting a cop car briefly gets the 5 o on your tail as does hitting a bystanders car, taking a corner too tight and scaring pedestrians.
• Racing checkpoints are dots on the track and must be hit in order to trigger the next one. With traffic build up or just not paying attention it’s really easy to miss them and have to back track, usually resulting in a failed track run.
• Map whilst big and showing certain things like mission points and mini games, it could do with a bit more detail like maybe a few icons showing shops for health, customizing and spray shops.
• Boss fights get really cheap. luckily you get good check pointing during boss fights usually, but this doesn’t mask the fact that bosses are hard as nails. They can leave you infuriated and cheated.
• Playing on the big screen is good in all ways, but with certain missions where jumping is critical, it can be very hard to see where you are jumping/landing, it almost feels like the game is too small and you suffer from it.
• The camera angle while driving is small. It could do with a camera panning out as you pick up speed ala GTA. this would make it easier to avoid crashes and most importantly bumping into the old bill.

 

In summary the game is just so much fun to play. If it doesn’t have you smiling from ear to ear then you may need to get yourself checked. Yes it has a few slight issues but what game doesn’t? If you’re a huge fan of the 80s/90s then you owe it to your memories to play this game. I can’t give any spoilers out as that’s not what you wanna hear. If you do then YouTube is your friend. It’s a solid game with humour by the bucket full. The video replay saves could be made better with YouTube support but that’s my personal wish. in short the game was totally worth the wait and satisfied the hype train no questions asked.