Summary [9.5 out of 10]

Hands down the most fun game I have played in years, Sunset Overdrive is a pastiche of near perfect game styles wrapped in a bright package and then drenched with genuinely funny humor. This game, which puts the player in the role of a survivor of a city wide mutant epidemic brought upon by a tainted energy drink, is fast paced, creative and fresh while poking fun at pop culture in general and video games in particular.  Exclusive to the Xbox One, Sunset Overdrive is the first game on either new gen system to make me feel like it would be worth a system purchase just to get it. This game is fun as shit.

What it’s Like:

Tony Hawk Pro Skater: The traversal mechanic here relies very heavily on grinding and getting around feels very much like the stringing of tricks and moves from the Tony Hawk series. It feels like if Tony Hawk had you killing mutants while collecting tapes and letters.

Ratchet and Clank: Given that this is an Insomniac game it is not surprising that it has the same sort of creative gun types and solid shooting that Ratchet and Clank had with the sense of humor coming over as well. Sunset Overdrive is more adult oriented but you can see its pedigree very easily.

InFamous series: If you swap out the super hero powers for crazy guns and amps then you have a very similar gameplay feel. Where InFamous  is generally more serious, Sunset Overdrive is irreverent and hilarious. There are a ton of similarities between the games but for my money Sunset Overdrive does it all better.

The Great:

Humor: It isn’t easy to be consistently funny in games but Sunset Overdrive really brings its A game here. From funny comments, scenarios and a metric ton of self-referential fourth wall breaking it has it all. I personally loved how often it referenced video game tropes and called out tired game design. The multitude of pop culture references were just right and often subtle enough not to feel like pandering but bold enough to land the joke. If nothing else worked in this game, the humor would still be a draw but as it happens, most things work in this game so it becomes icing on the cake.

Voice Acting: Helping the humor along is the excellent voice acting. The actors used strike exactly the right tone and it elevates both the narrative and the comedy. The player’s voice is absolutely perfect which is great because it would have been pretty easy to stray into obnoxiousness. Both the male and female voices are spot on and all the other voice work is absolutely on point.

Gameplay: Taken in parts there is not much here that we haven’t seen before but when all those parts are put together it makes for a unique and incredibly fun gameplay experience. There are so many ways to go about doing things with a host of traversal options and combat styles and the pace moves so quickly that it is really difficult to get bored. Even when not on a mission, there are a multitude of collectables that can all be used as currency for amps, weapons or clothing and going from one place to another is fun in and of itself. That walking often equals being overwhelmed and killed, the game gets you bouncing, grinding, swinging and wall running pretty quickly and you are rewarded for doing these things by the collectables available as there is one for each traversal method. Add to that the fact that the mission variety makes for new and different gameplay styles you never get stagnant. The endgame calls for you to be on point with all of these skills but the game is structured such that if you aren’t you won’t be getting to the endpoint anyway. That is not to say that it is overly difficult but rather it is structured so you use the skills you’ve learned in the end and you have to have learned them to get there. It is a nice way to do thinks that make you feel like a badass as you progress through the game.

Graphics: From character models to animation to fidelity and everything in between Sunset Overdrive looks absolutely gorgeous. It moves very quickly and sometimes it gets so frantic that you lose awareness of how good everything looks but it is beautiful from start to finish with insane draw distance and effects that are dazzling. Even with all the customization available to your character you never see a drop in quality or fidelity with the graphics at all. Everything moves smoothly and quickly and it looks great the whole time.

Style: The visual style here is bright and unique with explosions and blood splatters spelling out onomonopias while the whole thing carries a decidedly punk aesthetic. If there ever is an awesomepocalypse I would want it to look just like this.

Controls: This game has a lot of moving parts and there are a ton of options for things for your character to do so it would have been game breaking if you had to struggle with controls. Thankfully the game controls like a dream with an intuitive button layout and controls that are very responsive. There were a few moments of frustration here when I had a hard time doing something but it was never because the controls were bad, I just needed to be better at them. It is very easy to do exactly what you want which is very nice because the game is too frantic to be having to think about what buttons you should be pressing.

Weapons: True to form from Insomniac, the weapons here are fun and interesting. Using the post-apocalyptic setting and style, these weapons are all cobbled together from things left over and it makes for really interesting and varied weapons and effects. There is a pretty wide variety of them too which helps a lot as different situations call for different weapon types. There really aren’t any stinkers here either and you have an opportunity to use pretty much everything in your arsenal. I had my favorites but I switched around a lot as circumstance demanded. It is worth noting that a lot of these are pretty funny as well. The Flaming Compensator is an effective shotgun but it also looks like a dick and balls which is a funny one-time sight gag. The TnTeddy never stops being funny for me as it is a grenade launcher type weapon that shoots teddy bears rigged with explosives. This is one of my favorite guns and it comes in very handy quite often.

Customization: There are a staggering amount of customization options available in Sunset Overdrive. You can customize every aspect of your character’s look with different clothing, facial features, body types, hair cuts, accessories, melee weapons, footwear and facial hair so you have no excuse for ever getting bored with your character’s look. Aside from that, with amps and overdrives you can customize your guns and how your character plays to a ridiculous degree. The amount of options are staggering and it goes a long way toward keeping the game fresh.

Leveling: Using the previously mentioned amps and overdrives you can upgrade your character and weapons through how you play the game. You earn badges for doing things throughout the game and those badges can be used to buy overdrives which are relevant to the way that you play. You never have to waste points or awards on stuff that you aren’t going to use because it is unlocked based on how you play. So not only do you level your character up but you do so with things that will directly help you and the way you play.

Boss Fights: There aren’t a ton of boss fights here but all of them are awesome and memorable with different ways to win each time that are exciting and well designed. The challenge involved is always just right as well and you are never thrown up against something that you can’t handle but handling them is not really easy. There is usually one particular way to defeat each of the bosses but in order to do that you have to utilize most of your skills which makes each fight feel well rounded and interesting. I generally felt a big sense of accomplishment after each boss and not all that much frustration during. They are fun and challenging which is how it should be.

The Good:

Story: While the writing is pretty fantastic the whole way through, the story is pretty good. There is nothing particularly groundbreaking about the overall story and it kind of falls into a routine as the game progresses. Still it was good enough to keep me going from one objective to the next and there was enough convention breaking and pop culture references to keep it interesting.

Enemy Variety: There are three enemy types here and there are three or four different variety of each of these. That sounds like a lot but each of the sub categories are the same across the enemy types so it isn’t quite as different as it sounds. Still, the enemy types are different enough to make fighting them unique-ish and that is fine with me.

The Bad:

Glitches: There are some issues here with clipping and slow down but it isn’t too bad or game breaking. I had some moments in which I got stuck in the environment after clipping through it but those were few and far between. The glitches aren’t too egregious here and certainly didn’t detract from my enjoyment of the game too badly.

Conclusion [9.5 out of 10]

Sunset Overdrive is frantic, funny and very fun. It is easily the best exclusive that I have played so far for either new gen system and the first one for which I feel it would be worth picking up a system. I ran through this game pretty quickly and I think I had about 17  hours in before I reached the end but you can continue playing after the end and I still jump in to do things because it is just a fun place to be. I really hope that a sequel will be forthcoming. If you have an Xbox One and you haven’t played this yet you should do so as quickly as possible.