Overland

Overland is not lost in chatter or narrative interludes that shed light on why we find ourselves in a post-apocalyptic world, preferring to pay attention to the point. That is, setting up a turn-based strategy supported by a roguelike structure and offering flashes of survival mechanics.

Four-wheel strategy

Each game begins with a character with randomly generated skills and the same happens for each of the levels, which greatly reduces the possibility of playing twice a session the same as the others, adding a good dose to the whole. unpredictability. As in an imaginary chessboard, it is possible to move your group of survivors around the boxes by spending a certain amount of action points, then rummaging through dumpsters or car wrecks in search of precious objects such as medkits, weapons and shields with which to defend themselves and obviously petrol cans. At the end of their turn it's up to the enemy creatures to make their move, ready first to attack us and then to block our way, thanks to a constant numerical superiority that in the advanced stages always manages to put the players in difficulty.

Clearly, without the aid of a car, traveling thousands of kilometers would be a titanic undertaking and bordering on the impossible, let alone in the midst of an apocalypse, so in Overland recovering a car (and fuel) soon becomes the greatest concern if you do not want to become easy prey for this unidentified alien race. It goes without saying that the vehicle is not only a fundamental means to move from scenario to scenario, it is useful for example for cramming petrol cans and other objects important for survival, and that is why it must be refueled and kept safe from damage. , in order to prevent enemy attacks and collisions with the obstacles of the scenario from making it explode, also destroying the survival rates.

Stopping is as important as moving

The other strategic aspect is represented by the choice of stops to be made at the end of each stage, taking into account the cost in fuel points and an overview of what we can expect to find at that particular level, including survivors, fuel, vendors or others. vehicles. I do not mention the strategic factor by chance because with a full tank you can reach the final level of the section by skipping several stops, but the possibility of equipping oneself to face the most complicated situations is thus precluded, even if acting differently is still a risk to be calculated. For a reason that, however, is difficult and not a little to understand, it is not possible to use any object during this phase, with fundamental actions such as healing that must therefore always and in any case take place during the exploration phase.

It is good to weigh movements and actions before carrying them out, in this Overland provides some diversions that replace direct combat, such as setting fire to some elements of the scenario, including generators, whose noise or explosion can attract enemies and if necessary sweep them away. On a few occasions I have actually managed to clean up creatures, there are different types and each of them has different characteristics, and move freely in the scenario in search of useful objects. As I mentioned earlier, the creatures that populate the levels are attracted to noise, and often killing one has the consequence of making another pop out of the ground.

Collaborate to survive

In this horrific road trip experience it is also possible to invite other survivors (NPCs) to join us, including four-legged friends, increasing the chances of continuing the journey. You can be lucky and come across characters with accessories (the inventory is limited to only two slots) and particularly useful skills or the opposite, but in the absence of valid alternatives it is convenient to have more survivors to check. In fact, it is with the expansion of the group, taking into account the number of available parking spaces, that the strategies and tasks to be entrusted to the individual characters multiply, leading them to collect petrol cans and useful objects, or perhaps attracting the attention of creatures on a specific character, if necessary making mors tua vita mea a philosophy to be applied literally.

A necessary sacrifice, that of some characters, which I had to make in some cases to save the skin of others more suitable and functional to survival, also considering that there are very few reasons to become attached to them. Leaving someone behind is humanly better than using them as bait for the ravenous monsters, but some survivors will try to make them pay for it after escaping certain death, with a new danger ready to join the list. For obvious reasons, these choices have the ultimate goal of escaping from the level by limiting the damage to the maximum, and it is to be taken into account to give up one or more characters, especially if things go wrong.

At other times, the chances of getting through the stage unscathed come close to zero and the inevitable game over is encountered, often because they are condemned by the random factor represented by the procedural generation of levels. If an attempt is not born under a lucky star, then be prepared to have to work harder than you should to complete even one of the seven scenarios, which added together represent the stages that from the east coast will lead the survivors to the one towards the west. Overland can be very frustrating for this very reason, and it is not a title that I would define well balanced, indeed, it manages to be more punishing than it should.

In any case, it is possible to start a new game starting from one of the completed scenarios, so as not to have to start over from the first of the seven settings each time. In approaching the goal it may be necessary to start from the previous ones and stock up on resources to prepare for the worst, something not at all simple because with levels generated every time randomly there are many unknowns and variables in which it is possible to encounter in the long crossing towards the West Coast. On balance it is one of the few consolations that the developers have provided to players to make the completion of the seven settings less frustrating, and in fact it would have been absurd to try to do it in a single session.

While adopting a minimal but peculiar graphic style, with small portions of scenarios that resemble a diorama, I have never been struck by either the technical or the artistic aspect. Moving from one type of scenario to another, the graphic palette changes and one passes from city settings to woods and desert areas, almost always bare and little attention to detail. This poor characterization can only be partially justified also by the procedural nature of the levels, but I was nevertheless disappointed to note that also on this side, as well as the absence of any narrative element, a very bland work was done.

MODUS OPERANDI
I played Overland thanks to a code provided by the developers, downloading the title on Xbox One X, with the console connected to a Samsung MU6400 screen. I tried my hand at several sessions for about ten hours, not being impressed by the technical and artistic sectors, but fortunately I did not find any bugs or problems in general.