Bus Driver – PC – Review

When you ride the bus, you take
for granted that the folks driving the eight-ton vehicle have a good handle on
how to operate things. Well, somebody who must have dwelled on this thought
while they rode the bus to their game development job and decided to see if
the normally very mundane and boring life of a bus driver would be an exciting
video game. Now before you get the idea that you can drive your bus like a
maniac and plow through the streets taking out other drivers (you totally
can), you must understand that in this game, the points are made by obeying
the rules of the road, picking up and dropping off passengers and generally
behaving like a member of the upright citizen brigade.

Now normally this wouldn’t sound
like a particularly challenging game, but then things begin getting tougher.
You see, as you play you start off merely doing a bus route through the city
when there is hardly any traffic and/or other driving hazards. As you go
through the game’s challenges though, more and more traffic begins to appear,
extra stops are required, getting on and off the freeway, and construction
sites are but some of the challenges. Before you know it you are transporting
violent criminals from the jail to the courthouse or vice versa. Weather
conditions begin to affect your driving and even sloppy drivers of other cars
all mean to mess you up.

"Why do the tires squeal when I drive on
ice?"

As you go, the game scores you for
the little and big things you do. Using your turn signal when you change
lanes, stopping at red lights, obeying the rules of the road, stopping in the
predefined bus stop area and making good, safe, time is all paramount for
achieving the maximum score. Now I won’t lie to you, the game is very
simplistic in its graphics department – some sharp lines, boxy vehicle models
and a not so liberal use of color. The game is what we like to
call "retro-looking" in game reviewing circles. Now this doesn’t detract from
the actual gameplay. In fact, you would be hard pressed to find a game like
this from a major developer with the full-sized budget for production, so in a
sense I can understand and appreciate what the developers were doing here. It
clearly is a budget-title game, but makes no bones about it either and does
its best with what it has.

As you play, you are constantly
given points for doing the things you should do correctly and points will be
taken away when you don’t. Collecting everyone from the bus stops can be a
little tricky because the people load on to the bus at a snails pace, so you
could accidentally forget to get everyone. Getting your passengers there in
the correct time and not hitting anyone all factor into your overall score.
Once a mission has been played, a score is given for it and the person with
the highest score gets bragging rights by having their name associated with
it.

There isn’t much going for the
audio, there is a decent enough score during the title screen and while
playing. An upbeat, almost comforting tune designed to kind of fade into the
background. More importantly, there is plenty of road noise to go along with
the game. Brakes screeching, horns honking, construction going on … you
know, all the things you would expect in a game like this. Not that it is
perfect, because it certainly is not, but again, the company really did the
best they could do with what they had going for it. I can’t help but think
that this game is like the little engine that could.

"The double decker, when you absolutely,
positively must get 60 people there at the same time."

At this point  the game is
relatively average, nothing super great about it, but not horrid either, but
it should be noted that I really did not care for the controls on this game. I
can’t help but think this title really needed to be played with the mouse. As
it is, the game is controlled by using the arrow keys to move, accelerate and
brake, with the "[,]" buttons used for the turn signal and the enter button
for opening and closing of the doors for passengers. Not an overly complicated
setup, but one that feels uncomfortable to manage. Now you can reassign the
keys, but you cannot use the mouse or any other controller. Moving the bus
screams mouse control or gamepad, but it simply never happens because there is
no way to use them.

Gameplay: 4.0
Not as smooth or as nice as it
should be, if you are going to make a game like "Crazy Taxi" then you need to
make the controls much more engaging, and include mouse and controller
possibilities."

Graphics: 5.7
Like I said, it is simplistic and
resembles games from 10 years ago, but the game has a sort of appeal with its
clunky appearance and child friendly looks.

Sound: 5.2
Honk! Screech! Wheeeeeee!

Difficulty: Medium
Getting the controls down to a really comfortable science is probably
the toughest challenge. Otherwise, the missions go from easy to pretty
challenging in the span of about 25 missions.

Concept: 7.0
It is surprisingly a nifty idea.
It would have been cool if really off-the-wall things started happening like
volcanoes and alien invasions while you doggedly maintained your route. Now
were talking about a game that would get a budgeted production value and big
release.

Overall: 5.7
The controls aren’t that fun, the
graphics are dated and the sound isn’t really all that tight, but the game has
some fun hidden in there when taken in small doses. I think this is the kind
of game that will appeal to most, but will ultimately disappoint due to the
overall experience.