Saber Interactive’s latest simulation title, RoadCraft, puts you in charge of a company dedicated to restoring industrial sites damaged by natural disasters. Piloting heavy machinery, you travel to affected locations and repair infrastructure, combining offroad driving with construction management. We got a half-hour gameplay demo at Gamescom 2024, during which the developers showcased the vehicles and tasks players can expect. But does RoadCraft manage to truly capture attention? Our review dives in.
A Heavy-Duty Playground
With over two decades of experience in game development, Saber Interactive is no stranger to simulation titles. In recent years, they have collaborated closely with Focus Entertainment, producing games like Expeditions: A MudRunner Game and the acclaimed off-road simulations MudRunner and SnowRunner. RoadCraft continues this partnership, promising a fresh experience with enhanced graphics, dynamic weather, and more realistic physics compared to their previous titles.
Graphically, RoadCraft impresses. The game world is remarkably detailed for a simulation, from realistic lighting to visually convincing muddy terrain. Water puddles reflect the environment accurately, and the vehicles stand out in bright, stylish colors—yellow, red, orange, and aqua blue—which makes the world feel vibrant.
The core gameplay revolves around repairing industrial areas ravaged by floods, sandstorms, and other disasters. Players combine offroad driving with construction tasks. In our demo, we drove a yellow pickup from a first-person perspective, following an on-screen arrow to a harbor. Upon arrival, a brief cutscene showed a cargo ship docking. Switching to a top-down camera, we surveyed the site, scanned the area, and moved three red containers using a crane. Afterwards, the map interface allowed instant travel to another location to pick up a new vehicle or tool.
Repair tasks follow a structured workflow: clearing debris, replacing broken equipment, and reconstructing infrastructure like roads or bridges. In one example, a road destroyed by flooding required complete resurfacing. Players first delivered sand using a dump truck, then leveled it with a loader, applied hot asphalt, and finally rolled it smooth with a compactor.
Fun, If Sometimes Clunky
Some actions, like unloading sand, felt slightly rough and jerky—but RoadCraft is still in development, and these elements may be polished before release. Once construction begins, the management layer kicks in: from a bird’s-eye view, you can plan routes, set waypoints for vehicles, and adjust paths to avoid obstacles. Vehicles then execute these routes automatically, visible either from a top-down view or dynamic cinematic angles.
RoadCraft will launch with eight 4 km² maps and over 40 vehicles. Developers estimate 15–20 hours of gameplay per map and promise online co-op for 2–4 players, allowing simultaneous work on deliveries and road construction.
The game’s appeal lies in observing the slow transformation of terrain under your influence. Watching mud compress under tires or trees bend under load triggers a primal sense of satisfaction, echoing humanity’s ancient connection to shaping the environment. The physics engine—always the highlight in MudRunner-style games—shines here. Terrain deformation, winching trees, and vehicle interaction all showcase the intricate calculations driving the offroad chaos.
However, the heavy vehicles are cumbersome, with enormous turning radii and a reluctance to exceed 15 mph, which can feel frustrating. Fine tasks, such as loading logs onto a trailer with a crane, can be challenging due to inconsistent camera angles. While multiple perspectives help, they don’t always make precision tasks easier.
Verdict
RoadCraft is a remarkably fun playground, especially in co-op, where teamwork is key to completing complex construction projects. Each player can operate massive machines, coordinate actions, and enjoy the chaos that ensues. While camera quirks and repetitive tasks may reduce long-term motivation, the sheer enjoyment of slowly transforming a disaster-stricken landscape into functioning infrastructure makes RoadCraft an engaging simulation for fans of the genre.