KEO Preview
In recent years, we’ve seen a lot of vehicle combat games, and I’ve played and enjoyed quite a few of them. Tanks are too slow, but stick a gun on an off-road buggy and I’ll drive around until the bumper falls off, shooting at everything that even looks like it might explode. I’ve seen hovercrafts, hovertanks, modified cars, and now with KEO we have Mars rovers with shotgun cannons on top.
The core of KEO is strong: the cars handle really nicely, albeit a little slidey across the mostly sand environments, and the weapons feel weighty and impactful. The game has a clear style, and even at a distance it is easy to tell what is an enemy and what is terrain. KEO also comes with an electro-rock soundtrack that wouldn’t have been amiss in a late ‘90s or early 2000s cyberpunk movie.
There are nine vehicles currently in the game, each with different driving stats, health, and weapon systems — similar to characters in a class-based shooter. KEO starts you off with enough currency (called Scrap) to purchase one, a support class vehicle that can disable enemies and give minor boosts and buffs to allies as well as fire a shotgun-style blast from the top-mounted cannon. Also in the store are cosmetic upgrades which are only purchasable with Kreds, a paid currency.
I tried to play with my controller, and while the game worked I found aiming to be far too difficult with the joystick, and the driving to be perfectly acceptable with a keyboard. KEO makes allusions to a lock-on system in both tutorials and in the keybinds, but I was unable to get this to work. I therefore swapped to keyboard and mouse, preferring the improved aim over better driving control.
It is possible that the lock-on only works in matches, but I would be unable to tell you as I was unable to get into a game of KEO. There are two modes, a Team Deathmatch with a score limit and a Control Zones mode, but neither of the game modes have anyone playing. In fact, KEO suffers from the same problem as many other vehicle combat games: They cater to an audience that just isn’t big enough.
Which is a shame, as I can really see KEO being enjoyable to play; the Junkyard practice tool is fun to drive around taking potshots at the targets for a few minutes, but it’s not enough to carry a £9.99 experience. There also isn’t any PvE option, so I can’t even test the game modes against AI.
Overall, I think that KEO has a lot of potential, but so have other games in this space and none of them have managed to maintain a strong playerbase with the exception of Rocket League. There definitely is an audience for these kinds of games, but so far none of the combat-focused games have been able to find one. I hope that development does continue for Redcatpig Studio, so that when this game does come out of Early Access it will find enough players for matches to occur.
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