Keep Driving Switch Review
Version Reviewed: Nintendo Switch
I remember getting my driver’s licence in my final year of high school, and there was nothing quite like the freedom of jumping in the car with my mates and heading to the beach or the skate park for a great day of fresh Gold Coast air and good times. And that was especially true when fuel was under a dollar a litre. The world really was our oyster back then, and it felt like nothing could stop us. Keep Driving, from developer duo YCJY Games, takes us back to the early 2000s with a road-trip CaRPG that captures that feeling of freedom, adventure, and not quite knowing where the road might take you. But will we look back on these memories fondly, or are we about to break down? What’s It Like? Grab your CDs, fill up the tank, and get yourself a coffee as we review Keep Driving for Nintendo Switch.
Keep Driving puts you in the boots of someone in their late teens or early twenties who is setting off on a road trip for the summer. Your initial objective is to spend a month driving cross-country so you can join your friends at a concert, the perfect way to end the summer. Until that concert begins, though, you have plenty of time to hit the open road and see what awaits you. After a brief onboarding, you’re largely left to your own devices, free to choose which route you take and what you want to do along the way. You will need to manage your fatigue, hunger, fuel and car durability… Let your car fall apart, and you’ll have to admit defeat and call Mum or Dad for help. If they don’t answer, it’s game over. If they do, you’ll be towed back to the last service station you visited, along with a boost of cash to help you try again.
You’ll meet hitchhikers who can give you additional solutions when facing events, work part-time jobs to earn extra money for fuel, and even explore the wilderness for useful items… or contraband. Now, this might sound like a simple premise, but Keep Driving employs a procedurally generated road trip full of hazards and events that you’ll need to navigate. Each event has unique markers that need to be removed before you can move on. These can affect your money, fuel, fatigue and car durability. Events can be countered through your own abilities, items and skills, or by bringing along hitchhikers, each of whom has their own unique abilities. Hitchhikers can level up the longer they travel with you, and while some are relatively directionless, like the busker who helps provide passive income, others come with their own objectives and time limits that you need to keep in mind. Fail to complete their quest in time, and you could miss out on their story entirely. There are also moments of introspection and dialogue that not only get you thinking, but can sometimes offer some useful bonuses. For example, when you’re almost out of fuel, your character might find themselves thinking that there’s still a little while left in the tank, even when the needle is already in the red… that desperate hope that many of us have known before. In Keep Driving, selecting the right train of thought can actually reward you with some additional fuel, potentially giving you just enough to make it to the next town. It’s a small mechanic, but it’s another great example of how the game turns those familiar road-trip experiences into gameplay.
This is where Keep Driving really plays to its strengths. There are a bunch of narratives woven into your journey along the winding road, but there’s no rigid structure forcing you down one particular path. You can change lanes, take a detour, or simply see where the road takes you. Sure, the lack of instruction means some runs will be like getting lost in the back roads, and it wasn’t until my fifth or sixth playthrough that I finally made it to the concert. Instead, I left my adventure largely to fate. My first few runs had me lost both metaphorically and literally as I learned the game, and I eventually ended up settling down in a town after finding full-time work. Another run saw me helping a girl find her way home, but it took me far too long to notice the flyers scattered around certain locations that contained details about where she was from. I missed the concert, but I managed to help her reach her destination. There are so many moments like this in Keep Driving, where the road forks and the direction you choose can lead to a new ending, a different story, or simply something you haven’t discovered before. There are even optional roguelite elements that encourage you to keep going. Depending on how you play, you can retain upgrades you’ve installed in your car to make your next run easier, while certain endings can unlock completely new vehicles to take on your next adventure.
This adventure is brought to life with a gorgeous pixel-art style that reminded me somewhat of the point-and-click adventure games of old. Much like driving on the open road, it delivers a calm and relaxing experience for the most part. Each character has their own unique style and charm, while the events and environments are packed with personality and are great to look at. There’s an incredible amount of detail in the towns and cities you visit, and that attention to detail extends to the buildings, backgrounds and even the interiors. There is one small issue, though. The pixel art can sometimes make it difficult to read your abilities during events, particularly when there’s a lot happening on screen. It’s not something that ruined my experience, but it could occasionally make it harder to quickly identify the information you need. Outside of that, I was completely drawn in by the art style here. Keep Driving is simply gorgeous, and there’s a surprising amount of visual detail packed into every stop along the road.
A road trip wouldn’t be complete without some good tunes for the journey, and Keep Driving lets you collect CDs from indie bands to accompany your trip. There’s a great range of music that really helps drive the atmosphere, and you can switch CDs as you find them or simply listen to your favourite tunes. It’s really well done.
For my drivers looking into accessibility, there are no options to speak of, so as always, I recommend further research into finding out if Keep Driving suits your accessibility needs.
At $27 AUD, I was really surprised with the amount of depth and longevity Keep Driving provided. My first run didn’t really hook me, and it felt like I was driving for the first time, not really understanding how to assign skill points, not knowing where to go, and, to be frank, I was really underwhelmed. But the second I started my next run and started to understand everything, I was drawn into the world and did three or four more runs, with each offering something new.
Keep Driving absolutely nails the vibe it’s going for with its unique CaRPG gameplay, interesting event mechanics, and that carefree spirit of the open road, all of which come together to create something truly different. It presents several narrative threads, but still lets you choose which ones you want to follow, offering a true sense of freedom. It invokes nostalgic emotions of when I got my first car, and while a lot of those memories are lost to time and fate, Keep Driving somehow manages to capture that feeling and bundle it up with unique gameplay mechanics, so no matter wherever the road takes you… there you are.
So, What’s it Like? Keep Driving is like The Oregon Trail, crossed with an RPG with a visual novel style.
Keep Driving is a What’s It Like Certified Exceptional game.
In the interest of full disclosure, a review copy was provided by the publisher, but this doesn’t influence my score.
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