Star Overdrive throws you onto an alien planet, hands you a hoverboard and says ‘have at it’. Zooming around, hitting kickers and pulling off gnarly tricks feels satisfying — and rewards you with a boost of speed. There’s also light exploration, combat, and puzzle elements to keep you busy.
There’s a demo out now on Nintendo Switch, giving gamers a taste of what the full game has in store.
The game opens with the main character Bios chilling in space, feet up on the dash of his ship, rocking synth music in the background. A fractured distress call comes through from Nous, his missing lover, launching him into action.
After crash landing on the alien planet of Cebete, he recovers his dope-ass keytar sword from the wreckage, and is rescued from some exploding flora by Nous’ hoverboard. We hear the distress call in full, finding out that Nous is the last known survivor of an exploratory mining operation and has been stuck here for seven years!
What tragedy befell the other miners? Is Nous even still alive? Bios ventures forth to find out.
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In the Star Overdrive demo, you control Bios, riding around sand-dunes, activating dormant beacons to pinpoint Nous’ last known location. You’ll be following power lines in the sand to find abandoned structures, where you’ll solve puzzles to activate them.
Whizzing around on your hoverboard is fast and fun, jumping as you crest hills and kickers gives you more height to pull off trick combos. Tricks look cool, but also give you a little burst of speed when you land, keeping your momentum going. It can take time to build up speed when starting from standstill — or after crashing headfirst into a boulder — but pulling off some sick stunts will quickly have you back at full speed.
Not only a fast and stylish way to get around, your hoverboard also doubles as a rocket-jump and rocket-dash, increasing your traversal options.
You gain new powers for your keytar (keyboard-guitar) by acquiring and installing cassette tapes. In the demo, there was a ‘grab’ power that allows you to hold and move certain objects, and an ‘impulse’ ability that fires off bolts of energy to damage enemies and activate switches.
There’s also a skill tree to improve your stats and unlock abilities like increasing the durability of your porta-shield or the damage that your keytar does. Strangely, the ability to sprint on foot is locked behind a skill.
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The customisation options of your board are quite deep as well. You can find or craft components that will affect your board’s stats, like speed and handling. The cool thing is, when crafting components, you can seemingly put in as many materials as you like. You could choose to put all your eggs in one basket and make the best engine you can, or share the love and craft multiple components of lesser quality for a more rounded upgrade. You can also change the design and colour of your board for a more personalised look.
There is some light combat in Star Overdrive, usually small-sized enemies guarding chests or power nodes. Being able to rocket-jump and attack from above was cool, as was hopping on your board to quickly close the gap to an enemy, but the fighting didn’t really blow my socks off. That said, the game focuses more on traversal and puzzle solving anyway, so the combat felt sufficient for the short demo.
At one point there was an optional encounter with a giant sand-worm that I really liked. Latching on to the beast with the grab ability and being dragged along the dunes was awesome; I then had to fire off energy impulses to deplete the worm’s stamina, before being able to attack and deal damage.
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Overall I really enjoyed my small taste of Star Overdrive. Riding around felt fast and thrilling, the hoverboard customisation was impressive, and the giant sand-worm encounter was a standout moment.
Don’t take my word for it though, jump into the demo and try it for yourself!
Star Overdrive releases on April 11th on Nintendo Switch and PC.
