Developed By: Rocketcat Games/Madgarden
Published By: UKIYO
Date of Release: May 8, 2018
Price: $14.99
Way back in the dark ages when I was a kid I really enjoyed playing Apple II games like The Oregon Trail and Cross Country Canada during break times at school. That particular brand of long-distance travel/road trip game I particularly found to be relaxing and fun (until your family died of dysentery or you run out of fuel). I always found myself wanting to play just one more round of both. There was something addictive about the random nature of the happenings in both titles, you never knew what was around the next bend in the journey. Sadly in this day and age that wort of experience is few and far between, that is until now. Death Road to Canada is here, and it's brought a refreshing and macabre twist to the road trip genre.
The plot of the game is as follows: the zombie apocalypse has arrived and is in full swing, civilization is tearing itself apart apart, and it seems as if the end is near. However you hear that Canada has escaped the outbreak, and is a zombie-free haven. ROAD TRIP! You set out on a journey from Florida with the goal of making it to Canada and waiting out the end of days in peace. Along the way you can recruit survivors, search for supplies, barter with traders, and of course FIGHT OFF MASSIVE HORDES OF THE UNDEAD IN BLOODY COMBAT MUAAAHAAAHAAHAAAA-- ok I got a little carried away there. Death Road To Canada supplements the typical Oregon Trail style gameplay with a good dose of rogue-lite systems, randomly generating each sequence for maximum replayability. And that's a damn good thing, as I still have yet to make it to Canada, but that has NOT deterred me from trying again and again and again.
The pixel artwork, soundtrack and sound effects in Death Road to Canada are top-notch, and the production values are high. The writing and humor are also incredibly rich and superb. That said I did have a few glitches along the way, but nothing that brought things to a grinding halt. That said it seems like the game was developed with the intent to to make it playable by touch, as the interface of the review build is chock-full of large buttons that call out to be touched, and even the gameplay screen has a pause button up in the top right corner. However none of these seemed to be responsive to the touch screen on the Nintendo Switch when played in handheld mode. Not sure if it's an oversight or something that they need to patch in. Nevertheless Death Road to Canada is a damn fine game that is absolutely festering with the undead as well as replay value. I wholeheartedly recommend playing it.
