We played Music Drive: Chase the Beat on XBOX, and although we didn't discover whether music is the most valuable thing in the world, we concluded that the impact of music extends far beyond its performance.
The music-inspired game was published by QUByte Interactive and developed by Salve Game Studio.
In Music Drive: Chase the Beat, you play as Tina and Tunner. You have to admit it's quite an interesting combination of names. It is officially stated that she (Tina) is the best getaway driver in the neighborhood, while he (Tunner) is a top-notch shooter with perfect accuracy. Together, this pair uses their unique talents in missions, combining action and rhythm in a race against time to save the art that drives the world: music.
As the name suggests, Music Drive combines two things: music and driving. The game has 10 levels across two gameplay modes - pursuit and delivery. Let's not forget the most important thing - the main currency in this game is, you guessed it, cassette tapes! Of course, money is important too, but we'll talk more about that later.
In 'Pursuit' mode, you chase vehicles that have stolen cassette tapes, while in 'Delivery' mode, you deliver those same cassette tapes to different parts of the track. So, 10 levels with 2 modes = at least 20 playthroughs!
And all of this would be simple if your targets' friends weren't trying to stop you along the way by shooting at you, creating physical obstacles in your path, or simply trying to ram into you and knock you off the road.
But let's go in order. In the game, you are Tina (the driver), while Tunner (shown in the picture) is the one shooting at other vehicles (targets). Your task is simply to quickly catch the targets (and cassettes) in Pursuit mode and successfully deliver them in Delivery mode, while Tunner takes care of eliminating enemies along the way. To even play Delivery mode, you need to collect cassettes in Pursuit mode. Pursuit mode is relatively easier because the opponents are less aggressive and it doesn't yield much profit, while in Delivery mode the job is (a bit) harder because you are the target delivering cassettes, and the opponents are significantly more aggressive. In this mode, you earn (serious) money.
An interesting feature in the game is that you have the option to bribe haters, thereby reducing their aggressiveness (the desire to eliminate you at all costs along the way).
Earlier we mentioned that money, although not entirely the main factor, is indeed very important. By earning money through delivery mode, you buy and upgrade vehicles. By purchasing different types of vehicles, you gain the ability to transport a larger number of packages, and by upgrading the vehicles, you enable them to achieve higher speeds and be more durable, which is particularly significant as you make further progress in the game itself.
In addition to buying and upgrading the vehicles you drive, it is possible (and desirable) to buy and upgrade the weapon that your partner controls to destroy targets.
By fully upgrading a particular weapon, it allows Tunner to eliminate opponents more quickly.
Music Drive: Chase the Beat is actually a return to the 90s and early 2000s when games were simple both in gameplay and controls.
The gameplay has a deep arcade feel, with its fast action, and encourages you to want to restart the drive that sometimes feels fluid, while turning can be tricky, and sometimes you end up getting stuck in narrow passages. It would be better if it were possible to reset on the track itself rather than "struggling" with a combination of forward-backward. This is an obvious drawback.
The game can be adjusted according to your preferences. Here we particularly highlight the 'pixelated' option.
The game starts with the 'pixelated' option enabled, which is ideal for gaming nostalgics and the feeling of returning to childhood.
At the end of each route (level), you receive a final display where you can see how much money you earned and how many packages you saved or delivered.
The image shows the destruction of a target in Pursuit mode where the goal is to destroy targets and save the tapes.
The tapes we collected in Pursuit mode are delivered through Delivery mode. The image shows a successful delivery of tapes and the earnings we made.
One serious drawback in the game is definitely the menu, which is poorly designed. The icons do not have labels indicating what each icon refers to, navigation through the menu is bad, and selecting icons is quite awkward. From time to time, it happens that you click on something you didn't initially want.
As for completing the game (especially important for the 'Achievement hunter' category), it can be done in about 1 to 2 hours. The tracks are, with the exception of the last track, quite monotonous and do not require any special driving skills throughout the game. The exception is that last track where you are faster than the targets, meaning the targets enter the track at a certain point, so a certain estimation is needed to ambush the target at the ideal time.
In conclusion, the game has its shortcomings such as the menu, situations on parts of the track where you can get stuck, and the monotony of almost all tracks, but the game is enjoyable due to its simplicity and good sound. It’s the kind of game you play when you want to "take a break" from gaming. The controls are quite simple, and the length of the game is not such that it will cause fatigue and saturation. I doubt you know any of the music from the game, but you will return for it to save the tapes once again and then deliver them to the required locations, and some will do so for ranking on the global leaderboard of successful gamers of the game.
A copy of the game for review purposes was provided by the publisher QUByte Interactive
