Game Review: Drive Hills (Mobile – Free to Play)

Certainly up there as one of the easiest free to play games, what goodwill Drive Hills creates through a lack of pop-up ads it loses through a total lack of challenge.

This review is for version 1.0.8.

Press and hold your finger on the screen to move your truck forward with the aim being to reach the goal with your cargo still intact. With hills, bumps, cars and more along the way, you can slow down and stop by taking your finger off the screen. It’s simple and easy to understand.

Get to the goal with your cargo intact and it goes towards earning new trucks. However, there is no real punishment to arriving with nothing in the back. Sure, it won’t go to getting a new truck but you’ll be able to progress to the next level uninterrupted.

Keeping your cargo intact isn’t particularly challenging though. While unlocking trucks might seem worthwhile, these are limited and don’t change gameplay. Neither does upgrading them, which is done with money earned through play and via mini-games. Sure, you can get better acceleration and go faster but it’s hardly significant so it’s barely worth mentioning.

Every so often on one of your levels, you will pass an incident. This is where you can stop and take part in a mini-game. Stuff like monster truck races and police chases. These play out exactly like the main game, and offer zero challenge. Simply hold down your finger and send your vehicle over the finish line.

To play these though, you’ll have to watch an ad first. The same goes for opening bonus crates, to play the tyre squashing game and annoyingly, to get new trucks. Yes, the game promises new trucks if you deliver your cargo but fails to mention that when it reaches 100% you’ll first have to watch an ad to get it.

All of these are forgivable though as Drive Hills bucks a common trend for free to play games. Namely not spamming you with pop ads throughout. You will get the occasional one but it’s far less common then you might expect.

It’s a sad indictment of the free to play market that not throwing ads in your face every few seconds is praise-worthy. Especially when the game has its share elsewhere.

Regardless, Drive Hills doesn’t get our seal of approval because of just how easy it is meaning it lacks real replay value. You could have its current drop of trucks unlocked within 30 minutes of gameplay and after that, there’s nothing more to do.