Wheels of Aurelia (2016)

-- Part of my Itch.io Bundle Project - Attempting to play and rate every game in the 2020 Bundle for Racial Justice --

• Rating: 5.0 / 10
• Year played: 2020
• Playtime: 5-15 mins
• Completion level: Played some, didn't finish
• Verdict: Neutral, can't really recommend for or against

An interesting driving game that isn't really about driving, but more about the conversations along the way. It almost plays like a visual novel. Apparently has a lot of different endings, but I didn't see any of them. The pacing just felt a little off for me, either you had too many things going on at once - like trying to change lanes while also trying to follow a conversation - or you had nothing going on, because you're sitting there waiting for the dialogue timer to advance.

The story (or rather, stories, since it varies a lot depending on your choices and which hitchhikers you pick up) seems interesting though, and it happens in a unique setting that you don't see a lot in videogames - late 70's Italy. Overall, kinda not sure about this.

I've returned to this game I've checked off earlier without writing. The Wheels of Aurelia is a top-down driving game with dialogue-driven narrative. I get that there are branching paths (literally and figuratively) that decides the outcome of the car journey through the 1970's Italy. All in all, the prog rock enthusiast in me can rejoice in the soundtrack featuring rock progressivo italiano.

Besides that, this game didn't leave me keen coming back after reaching one ending. The intrigue hasn't developed enough to be intriguing for me and it's hard to enjoy when my attention gets too divided between driving and dialogue. At least I got it for free on Epic Games.

So I started playing this game but it's really not my cup of tea in general, it's not really the type of game I would personally elect to play if I wasn't just picking up and trying every free-for-a-limited time game I saw, so I'm not going to give it a rating and full review at the moment like I normally would but I'll give a little description of what to expect for anyone who might want to pick it up free. (I've only played through twice i.e. gotten 2 out of 16 possible endings which took me about 30 minutes).

There are two things to do in the game basically – drive and talk to people, and the dialogue options you choose influence the ending you get. The driving isn't super advanced, you can basically just steer and speed up, and there's an autopilot for when you're not in a particular hurry that will drive for you so you can focus more on dialogue. However there are times when you need to race or chase someone which is a little hard to do when your only options are to hold down the accelerator and steer, though I guess you can kind of bump into the other car if you want, I tried that and I couldn't tell if it was helping but I won the race at least lol. You also have to do that while juggling dialogue but it's not that hard since the mechanics are so basic. Oh, and you can also pick up hitchhikers and talk to them.

The dialogue is the part I liked more and I think the whole point of the game is to learn more about the characters and get all the endings to piece the story together, especially the story of the main character. It is kind of interesting and I may come back around to it just for the story, but the game is also set in Italy in the 1970s and there are all kinds of historical and political references I don't get so I got kind of lost. Maybe I'm supposed to learn more about Italian history through the dialog in addition to the characters' stories but yeah I wasn't really invested in that part and I personally wasn't a fan of the dialogue/driving combo so that's why I say it's not my cup of tea. But if you like character/story-driven games (and have an interest in Italian politics?) you might like this more than I did and want to pick it up while it's still free.

5/10

Wheels of Aurelia tries to blend the racing/driving genre with an actual narrative, giving us choices to make as we talk to a variety of different people. There's an autopilot if you don't try to control your car, which is needed if you want to focus on the actual conversations. Unfortunately, during some of the more intense moments, you are forced to drive if you want to actually say, win the race; this is a problem when you're trying to also pay attention to the story that is unfolding.

It takes place in Italy in the 1970s and I'm unfamiliar with the subject matter. With that said, it's reasonably interesting stuff, even if the game is incredibly quick. It's meant to be played for about 15 minutes, and gives us different endings, but it doesn't feel like there's a lot of material there. It began, and then it ended, with characters making decisions that seem very quick and therefore light. I didn't get any emotional impact from this game, and it really should have hit that considering what they're trying to accomplish.

So Wheels of Aurelia isn't a bad game, but it's wholly unimpressive.