Review: Powerboat Challenge 3D

Score:
79%

Author: Fish Labs

Buy Link | Download / Information Link

 

Yes, powerboats. High performance speed boats, perfect for slamming round twisty bends in the appropriate imaginary waterways. Four different islands are provided, each with a different visual style and each with four or five twisting courses and a 'shop' (of which more later). The visuals are terrific, from reflections of the sky to the frame rate of the animation, as you'd expect from Fish Labs, the developers of Rally Master Pro and Galaxy on Fire.

 

 

You get to play one of four predefined characters, each of which has, in theory, a different driving style. In practise, most players are unlikely to spot much of a difference because the overall difficulty level is set high enough that it's your own skill, not the virtual characteristics, which dominate.

 

 

You're offered a tutorial mode for the first few races, explaining the bonus and forfeit system. Essentially, you have to get as close to each buoy as you can while staying on the correct side of it. Just miss and you get 'turbo' points that add up to a turbo boost function that can be used later in the course. Miss by miles or, worse, pass the wrong side of a buoy and you slow down and lose turbo points. And miss three buoys and you're disqualified.

 

 

As you achieve results in one race, others are unlocked in your current island. You also gradually accumulate money (again, see later) as you place in a variety of predefined multi-boat races or time trials.

 

 

The races start off with uninspiring opponents, I was able to win on my very first try, but things get tougher later in your powerboating career. There's collision detection between the different boats, but seemingly no penalty for hitting someone else, so it's fun to slam into them as you approach a buoy, to use their boat as a brake for your sideways motion. 

 

 

Time trials are harder work, since it's just you against the clock. And it's here that you really start to glimpse the difficulty level of the game, with courses that get progressively more challenging and buoy placements more sadistic. Having messed up a time trial, at least the buoys are in the same place should you want to immediately try again (Powerboat Challenge is quite more-ish), so you can start to plan your curved trajectory through the water.

 

It's not obvious until you start to play how much planning each manoeuvre can involve, in that the faster you're going, the longer it takes to turn. And with buoys often placed near to the bank on corners, you've got to imagine and then perform ever more extravagant turns, picking up the sweet spot for each buoy on the way. 

Nice touches include reeds away from the bank - go through these and you'll also be slowed down, as you might expect - plus obstacles like the one shown above (who the heck gave that guy's hut and jetty planning permission??!) Again, there's no crunch or damage if you hit an obstacle, but you do lose all your speed.

As you accumulate money, you start to be able to afford items in the in-game shop, items which will improve the performance of your boat to varying degrees.

 

 

Disappointingly, buying items is extremely lack-lustre. You tap on 'Buy' and your balance goes down. That's it. No scenes showing the boat with the mods fitted, or even a message confirming the addition. 

 

 

Powerboat Challenge keeps lots of stats for you and it's easy to track your skill level through setting new course records. 

As with many modern games, there's a 'pumping' music soundtrack. And, again as with many modern games, almost the first thing I did was turn this off, finding it incredibly annoying. There are sound effects, but these are disappointingly limited to brief snatches when you past buoys or activate your turbo. There's no motor noise. No wind noise. No water noise.

Which is rather disappointing. Part of the joy of 'messing around with boats' is the atmosphere and this is something that's tricky to create without any ambient noise. Even a random 'outdoors'/'water' set of digital samples would have helped. And a proper throaty roar from the engines would have been even better.

But Fish Labs has got the speed and difficulty level of the game about right. Despite the near-silent environment, the feel of the boats as they swoop around the river is good and it's hard enough to get all the turns right that I definitely felt the call to keep playing until I'd mastered each course.

Not a classic game, but still worth the purchase price if you fancy trying your hand at powerboating. After all, the £3 purchase price is somewhat less than the £300,000 needed for the real thing!

Steve Litchfield, AAS and Ovi Gaming, 5th May 2011

Reviewed by Steve Litchfield at 13:10 UTC, May 5th 2011