In the totalitarian state of Petria, young people seek their salvation in escaping from a country that offers them no future. What they experience along the way is determined by you – and by chance.
As J.R.R. Tolkien wrote: “It is a dangerous thing to go out of your door. You enter the street, and if you do not watch your feet, there is no knowing where they will carry you.” This uncertainty of the open road is something that Road 96 addresses as a central theme. Because when you start the game, you don’t know which of the prepared stories and characters from Digixart’s August 2021 adventure secret will experience and meet.
Table of Contents
Get out of the dictatorship
In the fictitious, totalitarian state of Petria, things are in a mess in the 90s: President Tyrak, who has ruled like a dictator since a terrorist attack, has sealed off the border and the police are hunting down critics of the regime. The political elite pockets the profits from the lucrative oil business, while the population lives a poor life. Media loyal to the regime bombard ordinary citizens with fake news through the “Sonya Show” and play down the conditions.
No wonder young people in particular don’t make it in a state like this! Many citizens have little hope of anything changing on the upcoming election day, with Tyrak’s Democratic-leaning challenger Florres finding little support.
In this situation, you choose one of three nameless teens who start with varying levels of money, energy and distance from the border. Each of the seven chapters, playable up to Election Day, contains several scenes within which the teens make their way to the border on alternate rides, encountering one of seven possible travelling acquaintances along the way.
Besides some simple mini-games, you move through the scenes in first-person perspective and use the very manageable interaction options to start conversations, take a closer look at objects or use them. In this way, Road 96 most closely resembles a 3D walking simulator that impresses with beautifully designed scenery despite its simple comic graphics. Like a real road movie, the focus of the game is on the encounters with travel acquaintances, conversations and the emotional rollercoaster that awaits you in the procedurally generated chapter stories.
Many youths, many decisions
In each chapter, you play the journey story of a new teen. If you manage to escape, if your teens are caught by the police or if they die on the run, the chapter ends and the next one starts with a new teen selection.
However, you don’t see more than a poorly detailed portrait of the person you’ve chosen – but what you do is more important than their appearance. Again and again you decide whether your teens help others or only think of themselves, which changes the later course of the story.
In conversations or by destroying election posters, your teen professes a political opinion. Either you remain neutral and thus indirectly support dictator Tyrak, hope for a violent revolution or prefer the moderate turn through democratic elections.
The sum of your decisions influences the events on election day after the completion of the seventh chapter. However, you will only see real effects if you choose a side in all seven chapters, otherwise your preferred party will not gain enough support.
Burgers gone bad and cars stolen
As a hitchhiker, you can’t be picky and must take every opportunity to replenish your two resources, money and energy. You can use money to pay for food, safe accommodation, a taxi or an intercity bus to give you a lift. A fat wallet is also helpful at the border, as you can use it to pay smugglers and bribe corrupt guards. If you steal a car key from somewhere, you can even make off with a vehicle of varying quality for free.
Energy serves you as an action resource and is displayed as a bar at the top left of the screen. Every important action apart from scene changes costs you energy, for example if you run along the road instead of hitchhiking or climb a mountain. Energy is replenished by a round of sleep in a safe environment as well as food and drinks; even rotten food counts. If the energy meter drops to zero, however, the journey is quickly over: exhausted teenagers are fair game for the police of Petria and will be booked as soon as you end the scene.
Acquaintances from tender to hard
A real road trip lives above all from the encounters – and they have it all in Road 96. In contrast to the rather clichéd game world, the encounters that take place in each scene are all the more interesting. All seven possible travel acquaintances bring a multi-layered story with them, which you only get to know fully over the course of several chapters.
For example, the good-natured trucker John is dragging a secret around with him, policewoman Fanny has to decide between doing her duty and her conscience, and host Sonya of the regime-loyal “Sonya Show” is not just a superficial yes-man – and so on.
From time to time, you’ll even pick up useful bonuses from your acquaintances, such as learning to hack, getting a lockpick or expanding your energy bar. These bonuses also remain in the coming chapters and provide you with further options for action.
Despite the language barrier and thanks to the excellent voice actors, the exclusively English voice output manages to convey the mood and attitude of the travelling acquaintances. This is particularly clear in the case of taxi driver Jarod, who throws you into a number of frightening situations on his revenge trip and whose mood, which tips from one second to the next, emphatically conveys a feeling of being at the mercy of others and helplessness.
The scenes, which are experienced in a procedurally generated sequence, are all the more memorable and never allow boredom to set in. Calm, melancholy moments alternate with exciting and stressful situations in which your teenagers can also be in mortal danger. So be prepared to be confronted with violence and death – after all, you will have to deal with a serial killer, corrupt police officers and criminals.
The excellent, catchy 90s soundtrack also contributes significantly to the immersion and makes Road 96 a wild, varied ride. There are minor drawbacks to the otherwise successful overall package due to the always precise subtitle translations, occasional frame drops in scenes with long tracking shots and sometimes muddy textures.
Editor’s verdict
Some games just won’t let me go after the credits roll. When that happens, I know the development team has done something fundamentally right. I can’t get Road 96’s great music out of my head, but also some of the moments that grabbed me unexpectedly while I was playing through. For example, when I was pursued at the border by officers shooting wildly and the teenager who accompanied me on the run was shot before my eyes. Or when I finished a music mini-game with hitchhiker Zoe on trombone more badly than well and she laughed herself silly at my puny attempts.
Or the moment when I was locked in a cupboard with a corpse – as you can see, the game experience is like a potpourri of colour, with a bit of everything. I can also accept the clichéd division of the game world into good and evil, because Road 96 really pulled me along despite this point of criticism and many situations were simply so surprising that I had to react instinctively. In any case, I am curious enough to start a second playthrough because I want to know what I missed on the first try.
