There’s a funny appeal to truck simulators that many find solace in. Whether it’s the escapism from the fixed cycle of everyday life or just the childlike glee of piloting a great big truck, even truckers themselves have been known to play truck simulators in their downtime – truly a busman’s holiday. Road King takes a few strides away from the pure simulation, bringing a bit of sensationalism to the trucking action.
You get that shift from the very first moment, as you have to race to get yourself to safety through a tornado, even leaping Dukes of Hazard style across a bridge that’s crumbling into the river below. Set across North Florida and South Georgia, this is a part of the world that is wracked by plenty of heavy weather, that’s for sure, but this intro is a bit daft, it’s a bit over the top, and it’s absolutely a sign of things to come. But there is a more sensible side to the game too.
After the storm has cleared, you can get back to work, looking to build yourself up as a sole trader. Picking up jobs from the nearby warehouses, you’ll need to plan out what you’re taking on, whether it’s one big contract to a single location, or several smaller ones to ensure that you’re using the space in your trailer to its biggest potential. Every contract then has an expectation for when you’ll manage to deliver it, but if something else is on the way or a small detour, that can absolutely be worth your time.
But time isn’t just a factor when you’re on the road. Pulling into the delivery bay can have just as much of an impact on your multi-stage delivery plan, with poor driving leaving you with an awkward load/unload, which then takes longer to sort out. Reversing with a great big trailer is an artform that most people don’t have to deal with in their everyday life – unless they’re caravaners – but thankfully Road Kings gives you multiple camera angles, including a top-down view, with which to get it just right. It still threw my brain every time I had to reverse and the trailer decided to skew off to the side, but a bit of persistence would get me a high enough parking score to not lose much time.
Road Kings customised cab
You’ll be picking up jobs from different firms, and need to build up a positive relationship with them in order to secure bigger and better work from them. A higher reputation with a company will also see them put more effort into your deliveries, unloading faster, netting you cash bonuses and more.
It’s a pretty neat gameplay loop, and I can absolutely see the appeal, both on the wider highways and then pulling into a town, popping on the rev limiter for suburban areas to avoid getting told off, and finding the delivery location to pull into.
But there’s more storms and spectacular events rolling in as well, and there’s an urgent delivery that you need to make up Mt. Ramsey, as a wind farm is in trouble and threatening the local communications network. The weather effects really are a lot of fun here, lashing the twisting road up the mountain, causing rockfalls and landslides that you need to avoid, leaving other vehicles stranded and in trouble as you pick your way past them. There’s a narrative event here as well: getting a call from a different company on the way up, telling you that the original delivery won’t save anything and that you need to grab their cargo on the way to do so. You’ll improve your reputation with them, and lose it with the original mission giver, if you choose to swap, but you will get a healthier pay packet for your troubles….
And this is where this game really turns into a Republican’s wet dream, as the storm continues to whip up into a frenzy, the wind turbines become overloaded and their generators catch fire. This kind of incident is usually isolated to rare faults or direct lightning strikes, especially as turbines will lock into position during storms, but the game delights in taking jabs at greener energy.
So, that’s a bit daft, but I won’t deny that the bombastic explosions and weather weren’t a bit fun, and help make this a looser, less rigid take on a game of trucking. You’ve still got the sensible side of picking contracts and tricky truck parking, but every now and then, you’ll get to dive into a bit of showstopping silliness to boot.
