Friends, train enthusiasts, armchair commuters lend me your season tickets. We have a new micro-management puzzler arriving on Early Access calling at Lubdon Town only. Welcome train fans to the latest in strategic puzzle games with Overcrowd: A Commute ‘Em Up from SquarePlay Games. The idea of the game is relatively simple, successfully build and run your own metro style underground station and make sure the punters are happy.
Firstly, your disclaimer. I was given a key by the developer to help them with Beta testing. It was not to provide a review and I did not promise to give them a good review. The first thing I said on both my Twitch stream and my YouTube video was “If this key gets revoked, I will be straight onto steam to buy a copy.” and 50 hours into the full release game… that is still the case.
So what can you do in Overcrowd?
Now remember… most important thing first. This is not a simulation game in the same way as Airport CEO or Project Hospital. This is a strategic puzzler, you have to build up a block of land to serve as many platforms as possible. Do not think of this as your chance to improve on Bank station or add new lines to Waterloo… you will fail!
There are currently three different game modes, you have a campaign which you can play at a number of different levels. Generate your game seed and share it with your friends to see who can get the furthest through the 5 travel zones; each one more difficult than the last. Obviously this is my choice of game style as I like to stick it on hard and fail very often, being able to do it across five different levels of complexity even more so!
In sandbox you… well sandbox! You can have three different sandbox stations on the go at the same time, each with it’s own save slot.
In the Commute of The Day you have the worst of both worlds. The most difficult of the levels is a tough nut to crack. At the time of writing, there is a small issue with being able to save and continue the game, which the developer admits is in the works, mainly due to the late inclusion of this harder than hard level. This is something that I come to expect from an Early Access offering though, so I will be grateful when it is fixed, but I spent two hour enjoyable freaking out at the difficulty of the level to find out.
Overcrowd: A Commute ‘Em Up makes you think about transport management in a whole new way, as you struggle with real life situations in a comical way.
It’s a Great Game
What I love most about Overcrowd is that it appears deceptively easy. I know that some of you will look at the graphics and go “This looks rubbish, blocky characters, 8-bit music, it’s not going to be any good.” but I am hooked on the balance between making sure that you have the staff and making sure you procure the right things for your station to keep your staff happy.
Playing on the first travel zone of campaign you get a nice gentle introduction, even on my favored hard mode, and you are already laying your foundation for making your way through the different levels. As you continue through the various levels of play you have to procure the rights to both functional and attractive things to make your station both look and work better.
Now that is not to say that I have some reservations about some of the elements of Overcrowd as we work our way thought the daily commute. There are some issues that are expected from an Early Access release but to give them their due Alistair and Sarah are working their way through and we are seeing quite a few fix updates at the moment.
But it has it’s Flaws
Remember, this game is in Early Access, but at the same time, even in the Beta testing, I was honest and said to the developers that right now I was still 25% Sold and 75% Not Sure.
There are still some teething issues, there is a big problem with the Commute of the Day not being able to be saved at the moment, but at the same time developer Al was honest and said:
yes commute of the day was a somewhat last minute game mode but I thought it would be cool to have, and didnt want to delay game more. Will be looking at this!
— al (@SquarePlayGames) June 12, 2019
and actually he is right, as the game entered Steam Greenlight that mode alone made me want to play the game more. the problem is that to do Commute of the Day, which is what I really want… what I really, really want…
…. Ah… you don’t remember the Spice Girls racing around Lubdon Town ….
Anyway, to play Commute of the Day I am going to need to either set aside half a day to dedicate to it, or indeed press pause and hope nothing goes awry!
Would I Buy Overcrowd: A Commute ‘Em Up?
Actually, based on the developer interaction with his forums, the fact that there are updates coming out at least a couple of times a week; I would actually buy this game at it’s current state in the hope of continued development. Certainly if Overcrowd was released as a full release game then I would be saying something completely different.
I have high hopes for this game. I hope that the game continues to be developed.