Polish publisher/developer Tate Multimedia has revealed its latest game, Steel Rats. The studio behind Urban Trial Freestyle combines motorcycle gameplay with a 2.5D shooter, and Player.One has had the opportunity to try it out. While the game has promise, it’s clear Steel Rats still needs more time to develop.
Steel Rats is set in a Steampunk-type world filled with autonomous machines both big and small. However, like any good video game, the robots are all evil and out to destroy everything. Of course, this means it’s up to you to destroy the robots first. Players take control of one of four characters and hop on a motorcycle to blast through each level using guns and explosives.
Because levels are 2.5D, each stage only has one or two possible paths. However, each stage also has a number of objectives, meaning you’ll have to play through the stages a number of times to complete all goals. Because of this, Steel Rats felt somewhat similar to a Sonic game, which requires playing levels in different ways to experience new things.
It does take some time to get comfortable with the controls. Players need to control a motorcycle, shoot enemies and bust out combo moves while dodging incoming attacks. There’s a lot going on, and you will almost definitely die repeatedly if you are focused on anything other than getting to the end of the level. I was feeling more confident by the end of my demo, but still a bit like a baby giraffe learning how to walk.
Thanks to Tate Multimedia’s previous experience with Urban Trial Freestyle, the company has motorcycle physics locked down. Players will have to adjust on big jumps and obstacles to make sure they don’t fall over or crash. It adds an extra layer of difficulty to Steel Rats: instead of surviving each level, you have to survive and successfully pilot your way through.
However, it’s clear the build I played was nowhere near the final version of Steel Rats. There were a small number of control issues, notably in one section where you had to basically crawl forward or risk driving off an impossibly tall cliff. Of course, there’s still plenty of time to get the controls right and have everything running smoothly once the game released, but we’ll have to wait and see if Tate Multimedia can smooth over the rough spots in time.
Steel Rats will release on PS4, Xbox One and PC in 2018. Specifics for a release window haven’t been confirmed as of yet.
So what do you think? Are you interested in trying Steel Rats for yourself? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.
