Wheel Talk: Text And Drive

Text And Drive is a browser-based driving simulator with the added complication of a plot told through textual communication. Like the protagonists of a GTA game, you'll be committing crime from behind the wheel as you navigate through the traffic on a crowded bridge while trying to reply to texts that become increasingly urgent. I expected a sorrowful ART GAME, the sort of thing that would set itself up as an installation in my browser while sad piano music tinkled out of my headphones like the whisper of a melancholy cherub. Text And Drive is a smart piece of design though, a plate-spinning exercise in cursor control.

Essentially, it's a game within a game. Both are taking place simultaneously and only one can be controlled at any given time. You either concentrate on the conversation and occasionally flick back to the wheel, to drag yourself out of harm's way, or you keep your eyes fixed on the road and shoot out an occasional reply when the coast is clear.

It could be an interactive public service announcement about the hazards of texting while driving if it weren't for the ending (I think there's just the one). It involves a cleverly immersive in-body animation but felt a little bit too much like a needless exclamation point at the end of a perfectly reasonable sentence. Still, this is well worth a play.

Via Warp Door, which really should be part of your daily diet.