So Pacific Drive is kind of a driving sim, mechanic sim, exploration, and survival game all in one little package. You start out with your trusty station wagon in shambles (after the whole intro scene), and you get it running again and take it to Oppy's abandoned Auto Shop, her own laboratory and stable junction, only to realize that the car is actually a Remnant that is now attached to you in some way that will eventually make you go insane and run off into the Zone never to be seen again like many other similar cases. You meet three people, Tobias, Francis, and Dr. Ophelia Turner (Oppy for short), who are also trying to figure out ways to get out of the OEZ and are willing to help you to do it because you are the only one with transportation throughout the Zone (and because the car is surprisingly effective at blocking radiation and other environmental hazards). But doing that also requires you to somehow break free of the Remnant's attachment to you, which you will eventually do by uncovering the backstory of Oppy and doing many dangerous missions.


You can upgrade your car at the Auto Shop using the Fabrication Station, and upgrade your car by crafting parts researched from it as well, such as better tires, better body panels to make the car more durable, extra roof and side racks for other devices, to make your journeys go smoother. During a run, you will encounter many different types of anomalies, ranging from dummies that will explode if you poke them too hard, to small patches of intense radiation. If you die during a run, (with the default gameplay preset) you will lose most of your items and have a chance at recovering those items by going back to the junction you died at and looting your Remnant Ghost. There are settings to change that though, like modifying the items lost penalty for aborting a run or changing the damage multiplier for the player. There are also these things called Quirks that your car can develop over time, and will cause strange things to happen if a specific action is done to the car. For example, if you turn the radio on, your front left door magically opens. There is a station to diagnose and resolve those Quirks in the Auto Shop that requires you to state what action is causing something else to happen to the car. There are a limited number of guesses, but I actually haven't found out what happens if you run out of them (because I'm just that good lol), and if you correctly diagnose the Quirk, it will refund the used guesses and will prompt you to make a few simple things to fix it.


The thing that stood out to me about this game the most was just the amount of exploration and combinations of upgrades and customizations you can put on your car. You can find all sorts of customizations while exploring the Zone, including bobbleheads, antennas, hood ornaments, you name it. You have the freedom to make your little station wagon really special, and I think that is a great feature of this game. And the story, it's just so intriguing and detailed, but at the same time there's still a lot to know about it. And holy crap, when Tobias died I genuinely cried. He was such an important character to the story, and his personality went to well with Francis' smarts. He did so much for us, to help us escape the Zone that in the process he ended up dying. Now, it could've been expected that an important character like him would have something bad happen to him, but even then it still breaks my heart every time I play back the audio recording in the logbook. Oh, and the adrenaline rush you get when opening a gateway and the storm collapsing in on you is insane. Just the feeling of "go go go! I need to make it to the exit before I lose everything!" AND with the crazy sound effects there are is definitely stressful (especially if you collected a lot of things during the run) but if you do get to the gateway in time, the feeling is awesome as you literally just survived the junction's stability collapse a mere seconds away from you getting out of there. Quirks are also another thing I actually like, because they make the car feel more alive (and also annoying) but it's pretty fun trying to figure out why, for example, testing every button or action you can do in the car to determine the cause of it.


Honestly, there isn't much for me to put here. I mean really the only thing I didn't like was how slow the progression can be at times, because when you go into the Deep Zone you will definitely need a lot of upgrades to endure the long trip there, which can be pretty expensive (especially carbonfiberglass), and sometimes Abductors or Pickpockets are really annoying because they like to grab your car and possibly break stuff off of it because you get thrown off course into a giant boulder or something.


This took WAYYYY too long for me to write so I hope whoever sees this review can take it into consideration when debating whether or not to get this game, and I hope you have a great rest of your day (or night)! :3