Depth charges. Torpedoes. Guided missiles. Nitro power-ups. Mechanical frogs that skip across the water toward your nearest rival, exploding the moment they make contact. If you think this sounds like the prop list from some wild n' wacky arcade racer, you'd be right. But Powerboat GT isn't, at its heart, a wild n' wacky arcade racer. In fact, underneath the crazy weapons and speed bursts, the game has many of the earmarks of a serious, at least somewhat realistic powerboat simulation. Why then the exploding frogs? That's just one of the oddities about this most curious title.
A budget game chronicling powerboat racing. Hmm... Judging merely by its pricing and subject matter, Powerboat GT doesn't exactly carry great expectations. Yet somewhere inside, there's a good game trying to escape. Your first clue is Slovakian developer Arcade Moon's depiction of water. In a word, it's astonishing. It ripples, it reflects, it undulates. It's partially translucent, but not so much that it seems ridiculously fanciful. It simply looks like the stuff that floats your boat in the real world, and that's an accomplishment in itself.
The game is sort of like Test Drive Unlimited, but instead of a car you've got a boat.
As for the crafts that caress these usually gentle waves, they're none too shabby either. From the rotting hulks you'll see at the beginning of your journey through to the sleek, high-tech beasts you pick up along the way, the look is colorful and convincing. Even the way they ply through the water, the spray they kick up, and the wakes they leave behind go way beyond the realm of a typical budget affair. And make no mistake--you are in a boat. This is no Mario Karts on water. You're slow off the start, just like a real boat, then you slowly build momentum--momentum that's lost instantly with a too-tight turn or a bump with a competitor. Or a torpedo, of course, but more on that in a moment.
A budget game chronicling powerboat racing. Hmm... Judging merely by its pricing and subject matter, Powerboat GT doesn't exactly carry great expectations. Yet somewhere inside, there's a good game trying to escape. Your first clue is Slovakian developer Arcade Moon's depiction of water. In a word, it's astonishing. It ripples, it reflects, it undulates. It's partially translucent, but not so much that it seems ridiculously fanciful. It simply looks like the stuff that floats your boat in the real world, and that's an accomplishment in itself.
The game is sort of like Test Drive Unlimited, but instead of a car you've got a boat.
As for the crafts that caress these usually gentle waves, they're none too shabby either. From the rotting hulks you'll see at the beginning of your journey through to the sleek, high-tech beasts you pick up along the way, the look is colorful and convincing. Even the way they ply through the water, the spray they kick up, and the wakes they leave behind go way beyond the realm of a typical budget affair. And make no mistake--you are in a boat. This is no Mario Karts on water. You're slow off the start, just like a real boat, then you slowly build momentum--momentum that's lost instantly with a too-tight turn or a bump with a competitor. Or a torpedo, of course, but more on that in a moment.
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