Review for Onrush. Game for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC, the video game was released on 05/06/2018 The version for PC came out on 31/12/2018
Today I want to ask you a simple question: when was the last time you played a triple A racing game with an arcade soul and completely new? How do you say, don't you remember? Exactly! In recent years this genus has unfortunately fallen into a dangerous lethargy; the only ones who managed to instill a pinch of novelty were, as often happens, the independent developers. The limited budgets of the latter, however, certainly do not contribute to the birth of large projects, once again putting the entire fate of arcade racing games in the hands of large companies.
During this period of crisis in the Codemasters offices someone must have had a brilliant intuition and saw in the current stalemate a very succulent opportunity. In 2016, when Sony closed Evolution Studios for good, Codemasters hired most of its employees, giving them the opportunity to found a team, Codemasters Evo, and even work on a totally new project. Here is the story of how Onrush was born: an arcade racing game that breaks with the past and makes contamination with other genres its main strength.
What does it mean that Onrush is contaminated by other videogame genres? Well, it's easy to say: In Onrush you don't compete for first place, but rather to complete specific objectives. Sometimes it is simply required to accumulate points through the turbo and the sprint, while on other occasions it becomes a bit more complex. Among the various "tasks" we find, for example, the fifty of zones constantly in motion, the destruction of cars and motorbikes of the opposing team or the passage inside portals to accumulate precious seconds. In all this, the vehicles that appear on the screen will always be divided into two distinct teams and, guess what? There are also different classes of vehicles, each with their own peculiarities and abilities.
If you still can't recognize the pattern, Codemasters Evo has recreated the structure of many multiplayer first person shooters in a racing game sauce. In particular, we can compare Onrush to products like Team Fortress 2 and Overwatch, in which a well-balanced and close-knit team can make the difference between victory and defeat. Clearly Onrush also takes inspiration from other titles, this time belonging to its same genre: the tracks have very large settings surrounded by nature (MotorStorm), the physics is decidedly stylized and aimed at encouraging clashes between vehicles (Burnout), there is the ability to compete in different weather conditions and at different times of the day (DRIVECLUB) and, although this does not affect the gameplay, both your avatar and the fleet can be customized with skins and decorations (Rocket League).
Is Codemasters Evo being accused of plagiarism? Absolutely not, also because half of the titles we mentioned were developed by Evolution Studios. What the team did was rather apply a series of ideas and mechanics to a genre that was a little reluctant to change. If you are thinking this is easy, you are very wrong! Having the ability to balance all these different aspects of gameplay is a very complex task, let alone if the entire system is to be offered online as well.
Don't be frightened by what has been said so far: Onrush is an immediate and extremely intuitive title. The various classes of vehicles available are well-assorted and quick to master, the driving model is essential and very responsive, so much so that Codemasters Evo has worked hard to minimize input lag; finally, the interface is clear and minimal, therefore easy to read and understand. The races will take place by dividing the players into two teams of six vehicles each, but on the track there will also be some wingmen or puppet vehicles to be destroyed to obtain precious turbo. The use of the turbo is essential, not only to earn points, but also to take shots to demolish the opponents and above all fill the shot indicator. The sprint is none other than the peculiar ability of the chosen vehicle: the support class provides a turbo recharge to nearby companions for example, while the offensive class creates walls of energy that can slow down and damage the opponent. The objectives to be completed are always declared before the start of the race; in case you are not able to remember what they correspond to, the interface and the indications on the track will make you perfectly understand what the task to do is.
From a technical point of view, Onrush will not let your jaw drop, because the team has preferred to focus on a high number of cars on the screen, up to 24, and large and interactive environments. On PlayStation 4, the game can easily hit 60 frames per second while, if you prefer a better visual rendering, there is the possibility of halving the frames to obtain more special effects, details and reflections. The soundtrack includes an excellent selection of tracks with a high number of bpm, therefore able to adapt perfectly to the crazy speeds to which the game subjects us.
As for the game modes, in addition to a decent campaign there is the possibility to take part in online games with rotating modes and maps, or create your own customized race to play alone or in the company of users from your friends list. . For the moment the netcode works very well, but it will be interesting to observe how the online infrastructure will be able to react to the peaks of use of the launch. Finally, before there is a scandal, there are lootboxes, but these can only be obtained by increasing the level of your account. They unlock vehicle skins, outfits, cheers and stunts for their avatar, as well as badges. However, if you want a specific item, you can always buy it through the in-game currency, which can also be obtained strictly by playing or completing secondary objectives.
When Onrush presented himself to the public it looked like an alternative version of Motorstorm, but what was hidden behind the mask was actually quite another thing! Codemasters Evo in fact wanted to dare and go where no one had gone. He took many concepts and ideas from his previous racing games and combined them with an online team shooter structure. The result is an adrenaline-pumping, lightning-fast and chaotic title that's fun to play not only online but also against the CPU. Although it still needs some tweaks, the new Codemasters Evo creature is one of those titles that the more you play it, the more you want to play it. In short, Onrush is simply crazy!
► Onrush is a Racing Game type game developed by Codemasters and published by Deep Silver for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC, the video game was released on 05/06/2018 The version for PC came out on 31/12/2018
