Thrills, Spills, Chills, and Epic Combos in ScreamRide

The team at Frontier Developments has an amazing pedigree when it comes to coasters and amusement parks. This is the team behind Kinect Disneyland Adventures and the Roller Coaster Tycoon series, after all; nobody is more knowledgeable about awesome coaster games than these guys. So it’s no surprise to find that ScreamRide is an awesome, bombastic game which will bring massive coasters, thrill rides, and wanton destruction together when it releases for Xbox One and Xbox 360 on March 3.

It’s set in a not-too-distant future where everyone has become bored and people need to be thrilled to near-death. That’s where you come in – with giant rides to astound, amaze, and usually topple a building or two.

There are three types of mission levels in ScreamRide, and each one highlights one of the three pillars of this insane game. ScreamRider missions task you with controlling the coaster, trying to create the most intense experience for the riders without throwing them off the track. You control the speed of the car as well as its lean, which allows you to balance up on two wheels for some dangerous-but-rewarding combos. It’s a very arcade-style system, complete with global and friends leaderboards to encourage some healthy competition.

The Engineer missions make up the puzzle portion of the game. Starting with a piece of a finished coaster, it’s up to you to complete the ride – trying to make the coolest coaster with a limited amount of track.

And finally, there’s Demolition Expert. This is where the “destroy” part of ScreamRider comes in. Using differently shaped ride pods, you launch thrill-seeking guests into a destructible environment, setting off explosions and causing chain reactions to knock down as many buildings as possible.

One of the cool things about ScreamRide is that all three pillars of the game are present to some degree in each mode. For example, destruction and chaos are always a part of the game. Heck, in Engineer mode, you can build a coaster that hits an exploding barrel and collapses a skyscraper!

Of course, the particularly enticing part of ScreamRide is the opportunity to design your own roller coaster or thrill ride from scratch. Frontier Developments has made the biggest, most robust coaster creation system we’ve ever seen; hundreds of pieces, fine-tuned controls, and an incredible amount of customization options let you create the coaster of your dreams, and then share it with the world.

Plus, unlike coaster creation games of years past, you’re not making this ride in a vacuum. ScreamRide has construction tools similar to Minecraft, empowering you to make massive, fully destructible environments. Seeing the set pieces that people build their coasters around is often as cool as checking out the coaster itself.

Keep your hands inside the ride at all times!