You've been kidnapped in your own car, chained to the steering wheel, and forced to follow mysterious orders from a voice on the phone that has your gran held hostage. Oh, and you've been blindfolded. Not exactly ideal road etiquette, is it?
Blind Drive, a comedy arcade debut from developer Lo-Fi People, is a driving game played with your ears. And yes, while it sports some light visuals with a jazzy, Ape Out-style pulp flair, Blind Drive can (and arguably should) be played blindfolded—or at least, with your monitor switched off.
It's proper clever, too. Using direction audio from your headphones, you have to tune into which direction oncoming traffic is coming from, swerving hard left or right to avoid impact. Get hit three times, and you're out. Simple enough, sure, but traffic soon comes in faster and faster, as new sounds enter the mix. All the while, your elusive captor will mix things up by, say, turning the radio on full blast.
See, this reckless driving is framed by an ongoing story. Your whiney-voiced lead has willingly signed up for this gig for a quick buck, but quickly finds himself out of his depth. A voice-filtered test proctor mocks from the other end of the phone, egging you on and occasionally dialling in your gran. An absurdist crime thriller, as told by the voice of a Jackbox Party Pack announcer.
A focus on audio should also make the game's antics more accessible to visually-impaired players, and it's neat to see games exploring that space. Blind Drive crashes onto Steam on May 10th, with a demo available to try until February 9th as part of the Steam Game Festival.
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