Okay, I realize this is very much an old man game. It's a relatively realistic simulator about driving a truck; no bad guys to shoot or races to win. Still, I've always appreciated the romance that truckers hold to us country folk and the chance for a good American road trip. This game is a nice relaxing game to just destress with.
Most of your gameplay is behind the wheel of a big rig. Being a simulator, you can control all the little aspects of your truck; like the headlights, both low and high beams, the wipers, blinkers, shifting gears, etc. As I get older I like games with these little details that add to the realism. Of course, your main focus is driving the truck. There's a few ways you can choose to steer your truck; keyboard, mouse, or a fancy steering wheel. I chose the standard keyboard controls. I've seen some of the setups the serious players on YouTube have and those would be sweet to have. Of all the games I have, I'd love this one in VR the most. They give you several camera modes to switch between that make certain aspects of trucking easier. I usually used the 1st person cab camera for the immersion.
You do have to follow the rules of the road, to an extent. You get fined for running red lights, but you can blow through stop signs. Speeding gets you a ticket if you drive by a cop, and obviously crashing into cars isn't a wise idea. One issue with other drivers is that the rest of the traffic never seems to drive the speed limit. If the limit is 55, everyone seems to go 40, which instills virtual road rage in me, because it's not always easy to pass slower traffic... unless you drive on the shoulder.
The developers, SCS, have a devious business model. The base game starts you with the states of California and Nevada, since then they've been adding in new states via DLC. Right now they're up to Utah. I assume they'll keep at it until they reach Maine. Each state costs about 10 bucks, a bit pricey, but not overly expensive. Each state is recreated in near accurate glory. The big cities have your jobs and truck dealerships, while the smaller towns just have quaint buildings and maybe a motel to sleep at, and in between is stretches of open highway with beautiful scenery. You can drive through the glitz of Vegas, then find yourself in Monument Valley or the pine forests of the Pacific Northwest, and finish your delivery in LA. You don't get the chance to sightsee as much as you would in say the Crew, as you are always on the clock doing a job, at least at first.
In all honesty though, for me, there's something spiritual about driving down a lone desert highway at night in the rain in this game, maybe cause that's my favorite time to drive in real life.
Yeah, while doing the long hauls you are subjected to the lonesome highway. As such, keeping your focus is important. The best way to do that is a good soundtrack. There's no soundtrack in the game, but they do have several internet radio stations you can connect to in game. Some of them don't work as well as others, but there's a nice mix of genres for those that do. I ended up just creating a Spotify list of country classics and old trucker songs to listen to while in game. That two day (in game) haul from Nevada to Arizona is much less dull when you're singing along to "Big Bad John".
The 'challenge' of this game is to run a successful trucking business. You do this by completing jobs on time, so there is a time trial sort of challenge to the game, and getting the load there in one piece. Doing so will get you the most money for your work. After you do enough hauls and level up you can improve your garage and hire other drivers to take on more loads. So you switch from a driver to a manager. As you level up you also get to buy a new truck, pimp it out, and buy a compliment of trailers so you can haul more diverse loads from TVs to gasoline. Keep at this game long enough and you'll be running a trucking empire with garages in every state.
All in all, this game is brilliance in it's pure simplicity. You drive truck and that's it. Sure there's more behind it with the management aspect, but most of your time is spent on the open road. If you like the idea of being a trucker or want a good, relaxing game that doesn't ask a whole lot of you I recommend American Truck Simulator, or Euro Truck Simulator 2 if you'd rather bum around Europe.
