OWRC Police is about quick, brutal hot pursuits
Ah, the open road; Blooming flowers, trees swaying in the summer wind and 4-6 idiot race drivers blasting through busy and weaving roads. In OWRC Police, you've got to restore the peace by using the force of the law to smash said racers until their cars don't move any more... for justice!
OWRC Police: Chase Simulator, to use its current, full name, picks itself up and confidently struts into the void that was left by EA's long-absent Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit franchise, with a little sprinkling of the joy that peak Burnout (also EA, goodness) delivered. In fact, I think it's not foolish to flag this as an intended successor to the 'sloppy arcade racer' golden age.
I am, of course, being quite nice. OWRC Police's open roads and city layout aren't really a shadow of the inspirations they harken back to, instead resembling somewhere around PS1 quality. However, this is a pursuit game, not one about cutting down alleys, so who cares? Your officer blunders around like a haunted marionette, but then, it's about racing, so why does that matter? There's no soundtrack (I didn't realise how much I missed them) and most cars sound like the drone of nightmarish bees (and the three-second loop of siren noise almost instantly grates). Meanwhile, the lightbox effect applied to the Unity project that became the game world betrays the developer's focus on gameplay over visual fidelity.
But the gameplay is great. It scratches an itch that has remained... well, incredibly unscratched for the majority of the last decade. If you clip a car hard enough, it barrels into the air in an almost comedic fashion. It is, of course, also in slow motion, and if it crashes to the floor near you, then you'll likely get another blast of glorious, dramatic slow motion too. These racers also have nothing better to do than get straight back on the road after you've knocked them off - or perhaps they're racing to save their family, or something - and so if you don't manage to entirely wipe them out, then they're back on the track soon enough.
The majority of OWRC Police is spent bashing people off the road; however, it's an extensive map that you can cruise around in between busting races, and it's littered with repair shops and refuel stations, as much to my joy, damage and fuel levels persist between jaunts. While I'm definitely never going to find out what happens when you run out of fuel here, I think it's really important that they've included fuel (and repairs) as a use for the cash that you're rocking up. Although, as you might imagine, it's also a lead in for the monetisation.
It's 2025, and this is a mobile release. That does mean that there's a no-ad option, an option to buy upgrades and an option to buy in your currency for repairs and refuelling. This is all to be expected. However, the monetisation is actually pretty mild, and you can do a lot without having to open your wallet. That said, the ads are (by design) annoying and the network that - at time of writing - is being used (Applovin) has gone to extreme means to take up most of your time, making you wait for them to pass. If you enjoy OWRC Police, then the £10 ad-free purchase is more than worth it.
Ultimately, all of the modern greats - Hutch, Gameloft, and co - started somewhere, long ago. This isn't game of the year material, but there's something magical here, and it's free. If the developer keeps at it, they could very well be on the path to something special.
