FOAD

KABOOM! There you have it – FOAD has just exploded onto your monitor. I hope you are prepared for some explosive mayhem, running and jumping around on your screen. Be careful of the lava, though!

FOAD sets the stage in a very explosive and colorful way! The characters for you to choose from, the stage, and everything about this game are bright and colorful with a dash of explosive cuteness!

The level where you’ll be set loose on is a chaotic mayhem of colors, lava, safes, explosions, electrifying turrets, and moving obstacles. It feels like you're part of a WIPEOUT TV show with all the moving parts and obstacles.

Gameplay

As you can see, the art is filled with explosions and hyperactivity, and you might wonder if it's too much. But no, it works! While some might find everything that's going on, in combination with the explosions everywhere, a bit too much, I think it works like a charm. The game manages to set itself apart in a daring and bold way! Not to mention the adorable character designs they've created. Where a normal grenade would make most of us run and hide, these little FOADs are adorable and a sight to behold. With their quirky appearance, bright colors, and explosive capabilities, you’ll want to have one, or two, or who am I kidding, maybe all of them by your side!

So, what do we do in this over-the-top WIPEOUT level with these adorable grenades? You blow stuff up! As you're let loose on this level with all its wonders, you’ll find a ton of cool things to traverse, explore, unlock, and most of all, explode! Because that's the main aim of the game – score as many points as possible within the set time limit. While this sounds simple, you’ll need to find the fastest way to go from point A to B and so on, all while exploding shrines, vaults, and other props to unlock gold, gems, hotdogs, and more to rack up the most points.

While FOAD manages to combine mayhem, colors, and explosions into a milkshake that might overwhelm some, it also manages to give you clear-cut outlines on how the game works, or at least it tries to do so to the best of its capabilities, with a full-on tutorial to show you the ropes.

While it does a good job, it does lack in explaining some fundamentals regarding the stats of each individual FOAD. Some stats and their effectiveness are left to the imagination. During your various runs, you’ll have to find out the best possible routes to rack up the most points, and it gives you just enough information to set you up, but you’ll have to do the hard work yourself.

While I played some rounds of FOAD, it was a fun experience. Something that I found lacking was the competitive nature that the game can easily bring. While there is a leaderboard, I found it rather "hidden" in the main menu. I would find it way more fitting in the theme of the game and the hyperactive nature it induces to bring my score smack in the face and the person who scores just a bit better to make me go another round to try and beat them. There are various other ways I feel FOAD lacks to bring more competitiveness to the table.

Currently, the game is set with a single map to roam around in, and that does hurt its replayability. That being said, the map it does present is a joy to play around in. The sheer amount of possible routes, the hidden rooms, and treasures that you’ll find with every run discovering something new is very well done!

The above goes for the game modes as well, as FOAD currently presents us with one game mode, and sadly, that's all for now. While we can see enough potential in coop or PvP modes to roll out for now, though we will have to do with the solo rampage.

Review

All in all, FOAD was a fun experience and managed to keep me entertained for a while. Looking past the obvious lack of additional maps and game modes, it’s obvious that FOAD will have a lot of possibilities not just with the current game mode but with future ones as well, not to mention the potential with the FOAD characters by themselves.

As this might be the setup for a franchise, and one can only dream of where that might lead. Something we haven’t delved into is the current game modes the FOAD team has created in the UEFN that is a prime example of the IP being utilized for more than the current game we reviewed above.