There’s still something tucked away deep in me that rises to the surface when I see an Outrun or Daytona machine at the arcade. Despite the aged visuals, their bright colours, tight turning and hooky music always manage to pull me over to them. Roadlike has that energy, but also brings with it modern run-based practices.
Run-based, procedurally generated levels and a fun inventory system make Roadlike much more than its Outrun-adjacent appearance might first make you think. In fact, its structurally got more in common with games like Death Run to Canada or FTL: Faster than Light than it does its arcade-racer inspirations. Sure, it asks you to slide along sweeping roads to catchy tunes, but it also asks you to take big risks, plan ahead with your upgrades and to think carefully about the next leg of your journey.
Fifteen minutes into my Gamescom run of Roadlike my car was almost indistinguishable (on a statistical level) to that of the other co-op player. He’d focused on raw speed and accelaration while I’d leant heavily onto drifting and being able to ram other cars out of the way while I was boosting. He’d outpace me on clear straights, sure, but when it came to the busy city streets that were absolutely heaving with traffic then I managed to consistently carve a path ahead.
I won because I played as though it was a Burnout game, not an arcade racer. I smashed cars, bobbed and weaved through traffic and took risking near misses and slipstreams as a core part of my plan, and that’s why I managed to keep edging forward through the slice of the procedural campaign that I got to play.
Roadlike did feel a little early, and I don’t mean that as a jab at the visuals, I mean that there was plenty of opportunity for simpler versions of the multiplayer mode, including single shot variations… however, even if it doesn’t end up featuring anything like that, it’s an incredibly fun and tense roguelike racer.
Roadlike is in development for PC, it doesn’t currently have a release date.
