Broken Roads Review (Xbox Series X)

STAFF REVIEW of Broken Roads (Xbox Series X)

Wednesday, September 25, 2024.
by Peggy Doyle

From one of the best names in game developers, Drop Bear Bytes, and published by Versus Evil and tinyBuild comes Broken Roads, a Fallout style RPG set in the Australian outback. For those uninitiated, Drop Bears are part of Australian folk tales. They are basically predatory, carnivorous variations of the koala that drop from the trees on unexpected tourists. I feel the need to mention this because Broken Roads is full of Australian slang as well.

Bombs have wiped out 80% of Australia’s population, leaving the remaining people to fend for themselves in a new world that is short on resources. When starting you will be quizzed, and based on your responses, placed into one of four philosophical groups: Nihilist, Humanist, Machiavellian, or Utilitarian, before jumping into a short tutorial section. Each of the four gives you different dialogue options throughout the game. Then you will jump into events and start meeting the rest of your party. Broken Roads is primarily a dialogue-driven story, so be prepared to read a LOT.

Every item you pick up and interact with has an interesting description, often for laughs. I enjoyed that aspect of Broken Roads. One aspect I didn’t like was that the plentiful loading screens were filled with philosophical quotes, mostly from ‘old’ and famous sources. Although still poignant in a game about morality, they are often dry. This felt at odds with the real “salt of the earth” Aussie feeling the game seemed to be going for. Although possible causing the game to feel dated after some time passes, why not pull quotes from popular culture, like movies or song lyrics.

Broken Roads is brimming with character, and many of the interactions with NPCs are enjoyable. Some of the characters are downright comical, including a trader who wired his pipe to his teeth permanently because he kept losing it. Some of the dialogue options are simply ‘yeah, nah’, or ‘nah, yeah’ and those sorts of quintessential options resonate with me. Other options feel like they had been pulled from textbooks and felt too formal for the self-deprecating tone and humour familiar to Aussies and other commonwealth nations. While humour does play a larger role, there are some very serious topics covered too. You will encounter the messy relationship of the history of Australia and colonialism, also topics related to Indigenous people and working-class cultures.

Combat is Broken Roads is not a style I prefer. It feels akin to the older Fallout games where it’s turn-based and also encompasses many rounds where everyone misses their attacks. You have movement points, action points, cover, etc. You can have multiple weapons and consumables equipped. Ammo is unlimited but you do need to reload. This makes the combat a lot slower and more drawn out than I like in games, but given the gameplay style, it makes sense. There are multiple weapon types to use, and although I put many hours into it, I really wasn’t able to make a lot of sense of the pattern to make combat easier, or more enjoyable. Again, that is possibly just a personal choice.

Broken Roads had a few bugs and crashes, but thankfully the game autosaves often so you’ll never lose too much progress should you encounter them. I do like how the map fills in as you explore, showing everything from settlements nearby to areas of interest that could be something as unexpected as the man with the traffic cone on his head claiming to be a wizard. I also liked how some skills will upgrade by simply interacting with things.

While I appreciate the ‘open quest’ design of Broken Roads, it was a little too open for me. I repeatedly found myself stuck and unable to progress for extended amounts of time because I couldn’t finish a quest on which I was working. Either because I couldn’t find the item I was searching for or any other frustrating reason. I couldn’t leave an area until I completed collecting an item for instance, meaning I spent a frustratingly long amount of time because I simply didn’t understand what I was looking for or where to locate it. There didn’t appear to be a hint system either. Mostly it felt like a never-ending journal checklist while waiting for something story-driven to happen. With a game based on dialogue choice, I often felt that I really couldn’t just choose anything I wanted without really messing up my story. It felt like there was always a ‘right’ answer.

Despite my sounding negative, Broken Roads isn’t bland. Its writing is quirky and some of the ideas are so out of left field that it kept catching me off guard. I just couldn’t seem to stay invested or care all that much. It’s unfortunate, as I loved the idea of spending some game time in the Australian Outback, but the gameplay just couldn’t seem to keep me on the trail.

The highlight of the game for me is the visual component. It is a painting-like style that I enjoy that depicted the Australian Outback well with its dirt, sparse vegetation, and small buildings with rusty tin roofs. I also liked the glossary that helped identify terms in the game, especially the Aussie slang, to help those unfamiliar. None of the minimal dialogue that was voiced, or the soundtrack really stood out for me.

Broken Roads is a sharply written, intellectual adventure RPG where your choices of dialogue and problem-solving are drawn from philosophical concepts. That’s what it does best and what kept me playing through the hours spent in the Australian Outback. The concept was great, but sadly the gameplay wasn’t for me. Trying to drop a fully fleshed out CRPG in about 20 hours was a monumental task and I wish they kept to just the morality system and philosophical dialogue. That was where the Broken Roads were more favourably traveled. I liked its style and tone and if that resonates with you, perhaps you’d like to spend some time with it as well.

**Broken Roads was provided by the publisher and reviewed on an Xbox Series X**

Overall: 6.5 / 10
Gameplay: 6.5 / 10
Visuals: 8.0 / 10
Sound: 6.0 / 10

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STAFF REVIEW of Broken Roads (Xbox Series X)

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