Star Overdrive

Star Overdrive is an open-world exploration game set on the alien planet of Cebete. Following a distress signal from your partner, Nous, protagonist Bios sets out to explore this strange world to save her, but along the way he will also discover new mysteries that need solving. Bios’s main goal is to find three Fractual orbs to power the towering Orbital Elevator, where Bios is certain Nous is. Of course this is not a simple ask, with many tasks and puzzles ahead before he can succeed in this goal. 

Since Breath of the Wild was released back in 2017, we’ve been graced with a slew of games inspired by this title, such was its impact on the gaming world. Some have taken certain aspects of the game to include in their own; some have taken much more, but I was taken aback by how much Caracal Games had been inspired by Breath of the Wild. From towers to shrines, there are many, many aspects to Star Overdrive that we will have seen and experienced before from Breath of the Wild. It’s also worth pointing out that Star Overdrive features mechanics we’ve all seen in these types of open-world games before. Skill trees, crafting, resource collecting, upgrades, and combat all feature, and I do have some things to say on a couple of these, but it’s all pretty much standard stuff, so there’s not much point in delving into the nitty-gritty of the majority of them here. 

What I would like to delve into first and what hits you as soon as you start is the way the game handles its storyline. I was very appreciative of how this was handled; with no heavy exposition thrown at me at the start, it was all fed to me throughout the game in little chunks through messages that Nous had left scattered around the planet. I never felt overwhelmed as I sometimes can in these types of games, plus it fed into the welcoming atmosphere the game produced, giving it this air of futuristic mystery that I very much welcomed with open arms. 

This is a science fiction tale, with strange creatures roaming the land, broken monstrous mining machines littering the horizon, and peculiar metal structures everywhere; it is a new world beautifully realised to a certain point. The more I played and explored, the more I realised just how similar the terrain was. It makes sense, as if you visited Mars, the world would just be a desolate rocky place, and it’s the same vibe here. The only difference is that real-life Mars is not a video game, so I did become slightly bored of the sandy desert world after a while and was craving some sort of variety. The developers did try to circumvent this by including water in many sections and grassy areas, but it only alleviated this feeling slightly. It was the idea of this being an abandoned planet, void of humanoid life, that really made me feel this way. Although, as you’ll learn early on, there used to be a heavy mining presence on the planet, they have long gone, just leaving their technology behind. Because of this, there are no other characters to interact with, no settlements to explore, just the wide open desert and your mission to complete.

Thankfully, there are many distractions that took my mind off this problem, and the biggest was how you reveal the map. This is one of the heavy Breath of the Wild inclusions, as you have to climb a tower in each section of the world, and once a switch has been activated, that section of the map will be revealed. To finish, you’ll be given the chance to be fired from the top of the tower, in the direction of your choosing. Each tower is climbed by moving platforms, with each tower holding different patterns and timings. Just like in Zelda, I took much pleasure in travelling to each tower with much satisfaction in revealing a part of the map.

Fast travel to towers is locked quite a way into the skill tree, so my biggest suggestion to you would be to focus your energy on unlocking this as soon as possible, as it will make travelling around so much easier. To unlock a section of the skill tree, you’ll need to visit mines, which are another inspiration from Breath of the Wild, as they are basically shrines but much bigger in scale. When you reach the end of a mine, it will grant you an item that you can use to unlock a part of the skill tree. 

Each mine will task you with a range of different styles of puzzles. Some were more obtuse than others, and with the game not holding your hand, it can leave you with moments of longing confusion. You really need to play with the tools you have and strong concentration to properly figure out some of the puzzles. With no guide to fall back on, I found myself in this position on a couple of occasions, but with some thought and experimentation, I finally came up with the right solutions.

The other major mechanic tied to these mines is the different abilities that you can find for Bios’s main weapon, the Keytar. These are represented by cassette tapes (these will look alien to you if you are not as old as me, who can remember these!), that will give your keyboard-styled sword some meaty upgrades. The first was a carbon copy of Link’s ultra hand, letting you pick up certain items and open heavy doors. I was slightly concerned at this point though, thinking they were just going to go down the route of implementing the same abilities from the Zelda games. Thankfully I was proven wrong as all the other powers were fun, imaginative, and used well in the puzzles and transversal. A couple of personal favourites were the charm ability, which lets you control a creature to either attack other creatures or to be guided into pens, which will unlock chests. My other favourite was Jump, letting you create a jump pad wherever you like, which helped me out immensely on many occasions.

These abilities came in very handy in combat too, where you can use magnet to rip the armour of enemies or turn them into bouncy balls with Jump, which you can then attack without fear of retaliation. This made the combat much more enjoyable, as standard battling was a little tiring and not that effective. In some instances, I walked into an ambush and was dead before I could blink, as enemies are surprisingly powerful, so you need to be prepared if you are to succeed. Though I was saddened to find out if an enemy were to fall off the edge of a platform, they didn’t drop to their demise but instead respawned back in their original spot, armour intact, ready to attack again. Slightly unfair, but at least their health didn’t respawn too! 

The other main element you’ll be doing is exploring the world, which is best done on your hoverboard. As mentioned, this can be upgraded to increase certain elements like its gravity, boost, aerodynamics, and engine. If you jump at the right times while gliding, you can perform tricks that will give you a temporary boost and fill up your stamina wheel. I had a great time using the hoverboard; the motion of gliding across what is surprisingly a large open world was well implemented, with good physics and motion. One problem I had, though, was where the camera locked behind Bios when using the hoverboard, so I couldn’t pan 360 degrees to see around me, which did lead to some issues. The biggest being that in some instances I couldn’t see where I was going, blindingly guessing my way, which sometimes led me to my death or falling off an edge. Sometimes I just wanted to take in the surrounding area or see if there was a point of interest nearby, but I was just not allowed. 

I had a couple of other frustrations too, with the first being with Bio’s movement. Moving forward and backwards was fine, but pressing left and right caused him to strafe slowly. In theory, a good idea; in practice, not really. It constantly threw me off, slowing me down especially when I was trying to escape an ambush or platforming. The other was when I died. You’ll receive some lovely music and a game over screen every single time, then respawn at the spot you died. No biggie really, but I died many times, and after a while it was grating, especially as all I wanted to do was get on with it. 

Still, the visual direction that the developers took was an impressive one. Going for a cel-shaded style, it really fitted this sci-fi alien world perfectly. Everything looked gorgeous and included many little details, from worn metal on the towers to the patterns in the sand. I loved how Bios was designed too, with his cool, stuck-up white hair and grunge look, and I appreciated the little touches like his headphones hanging from his belt.