In Deliver At All Costs, you deliver valuable goods across an almost completely destructible city. You can see where this is going. I tried the game at Steam Next and I’m hooked.
Deliver At All Costs kicks off with a bang! Well, almost. Technically, the game starts with me, as the main character Winston, waking up in my apartment to find a letter from my landlady demanding three months’ rent. Phew.
Luckily, I saw a job ad in the paper, so I get in my car and drive off – only to crash full speed backwards into a house, which spectacularly crumbles into a pile of rubble. There we have the bang. In the world of Deliver At All Costs, however, that doesn’t seem to be a major problem: I get annoyed about the reverse gear being engaged and then jet off to the job interview. But it’s only after that that the real chaos begins.
Good mood, Fallout flair and lots of destruction
A short time later – during the drive, only a few lanterns fell victim to my lack of driving skills – I am on my way to my first job for the delivery service that hired me. In the meantime, I have gotten a little used to the controls of Deliver At All Costs and I am having a lot of fun with it:
My car accelerates a bit jerkily, which makes precise parking difficult, but with a little skill, my new pickup truck can be steered elegantly between houses and other road users, even at high speeds. And I’m an absolute racing game noob.
Controller or keyboard?
The developers of Deliver At All Cost recommend that you use a controller. But since I’m about as good with a gamepad as a chimp is with a typewriter, I still used a mouse and keyboard and am doing surprisingly well.
On the way, I enjoy the beautifully illuminated city with its buildings and vehicles in the style of the 1950s. Together with the whimsical soundtrack, it almost feels like Fallout. The only problem is that the city isn’t destroyed enough for that yet, but that can and will change quickly.
Fireworks!
My first delivery is highly explosive: I’m transporting a large load of fireworks to a party, but the rockets are anything but insensitive. You can see what happens in the gameplay clip:
As soon as I set off, the fireworks fly in all directions and put on a really great show. Since I don’t want to lose any time on my first job, I just drive on and leave a trail of destruction. The fireworks hit like grenades, destroy cars and knock pedestrians to the ground.
And I’m not safe from the fireworks either: if I don’t swerve, it will destroy my tires. While trying to get through the barrage unscathed, I also take out a few utility poles and some pedestrians. A short time later, an angry mob of victims of my reckless driving style chases after me. Somehow, though, I manage to deliver my cargo to its destination and shake off the disgruntled road users. Mission accomplished!
