There are plenty of simple, entertaining Windows Phone games out there to help you pass the time and Smashy Road: Wanted hopes to be included in that group. The game has you racing through the desert, grasslands and city streets with one goal in mind, escaping the police.
The authorities will throw everything at you including chase helicopters, SWAT vans, tanks and roadblocks. The Windows Phone game has 90 vehicles to unlock or purchase and plenty of high-speed action. Available from the Windows Phone Store, with support for low-memory Phones, Smashy Road: Wanted comes across as a fun time waster of a game.
Smashy Road: Wanted isn't a very complicated game and the main menu reflects as much with a single option: visit the game's garage to choose your vehicle. To start gameplay, just tap the screen. You will find a left and right steering button on the respective sides of the gaming screen, acceleration is automatic and your job is simply to avoid being captured by the police.
The longer you last, the higher the score. You will also find cash littering the gaming screen that you can collect towards unlocking additional cars. The garage has 90 vehicles to unlock and you can gain access to them in one of two ways. First, you can unlock them through an in-app purchase that ranges from $.99 to $3.99 per vehicle. The second option is to collect $100 in gaming cash and play a game of slots to randomly unlock new vehicles.
Gameplay calls on you to drive your car through the various settings and avoid being captured by the police. You have desert roads, congested city streets, and wide-open rural highways to contend with. Law enforcement will throw everything at you including patrol cruisers, SWAT vans, Humvees, helicopters and tanks. If you survive the chase long enough, the military will join in on the pursuit.
There are no "rules of the road" with crashing into other cars, trees, road signs and fences being an acceptable means to flee your pursuers. Your car can sustain damage and the more dinged up your ride gets, the better the chances the police will capture you. Oh and you can drive your car into rivers and lakes, which will ruin your day as well.
Should your vehicle hit an immovable object (e.g. house, pyramid, brick wall, etc.), your vehicle will shift into reverse long enough to allow you to steer clear of the object. Should the police surround you where you cannot escape or your vehicle gets too damaged, the game is over.
Fast and Furious and Pixelated
Smashy Road: Wanted is a fun, uncomplicated, and challenging game to pass the time. The objective is simple but not easily mastered. The pixelated graphics and animations look good and the game has a huge collection of vehicles to unlock. You have everything from muscle cars to RV campers to tanks to unlock and race.
I would have liked to have seen more than one vehicle available from the start, but it only takes you a few races to reach that first $100 mark where you can unlock an additional vehicle. Gameplay is well suited for those times you need a quick gaming fix and addictive enough to pull you in for longer gaming sessions.
Smashy Road: Wanted is available from the Windows Phone Store with indications that it may be available for Windows 10 PC in the future. Smashy Road: Wanted is a free game with plenty of in-app purchase opportunities. There is also support for low-memory devices.
Download Smashy Road: Wanted for Windows Phone
