RoadCraft review: Paved paradise

RoadCraft unleashed my inner child when its demo dropped earlier this year. 

Tasking the player with rebuilding disaster zones using various examples of heavy plant, the game resembled a giant Tonka toy-filled sandbox, something developer Saber Interactive leaned into heavily with its marketing.

The popularity of the Diggerland theme park, where grown adults can operate diggers, dump trucks and excavators in a controlled environment, is testament to the fact that big kids love mucking about with heavy plant (no doubt fantasising about filling in the potholes that blight their daily commutes while doing so). RoadCraft could well have mass appeal as a result.

The demo was largely a freeform introduction to RoadCraft’s systems, vehicles and four of the eight areas expected in its v1.0 release, with this full version the real test of how its mission-based structure would fare within a laissez-faire framework.  

Disaster zones

The campaign mode is where most RoadCraft players will start their journey, with your omnipresent handler Kelly dishing out missions and objectives (and a valid CSCS card, presumably).

Completing tasks earns cash, which you can use to buy new vehicles with a range of useful abilities, with most vehicle types unlocked via career progression. The game introduces you to new mechanics gradually, but is quite light on exposition. You’ll often feel a tad confused about how to proceed, so it’s best to play with vehicle control hints turned on.

Your first major decision is to pick your Scout vehicle. You can choose between a Land Rover Defender-like off-roader or a beefier American-made truck (a Humvee-style 4×4 is also available as DLC). The next step is to set up your disaster relief business – mine is called ‘PaveNSave’ – and choose a livery for your fleet. No mention of steel toecaps, strangely.

Vehicle behaviour feels odd initially; the Scout vehicles are the quickest in-game and feel skittish from the outset, seeing you wildly counter-steering through muddy puddles. However, the handling model makes far more sense when switching to the slower vehicles that form the backbone of the game.

Economise

RoadCraft overwhelms with its choice of machinery and tasks initially, with players given the keys to mobile cranes, cable layers, stump mulchers, trucks, tracked vehicles, tree harvesters, bulldozers, pavers and rollers all within the first couple of maps.

Each has its own idiosyncrasies, but cranes are the trickiest to operate no matter which control scheme you opt for. Each crane type (there are static and mobile varieties) seemingly follows a different button layout, which only adds to the confusion. Best get your hard hats on then, lads.

Eventually, you’ll spot a pattern to most of RoadCraft’s missions, which essentially boil down to simple fetch quests with a bit of set dressing. Some require you to lay underground cables to help power facilities, others compel you to load up objects before delivering them to a hard-to-reach location. 

Each map also demands that you collect resources: find scrap, collect it and then recycle it into primary materials like steel girders or pipes, which – you guessed it – have to be transported or fitted in other locations.

Thankfully, the further you progress into career mode, the more interesting these fetch quests become, encouraging you to think on your feet and employ the skills you’ve learnt. 

Thinking on your feet

One such example arrived when I was faced with collecting a container from an abandoned quarry. Two large concrete slabs were missing from the bridge at the quarry entrance, seemingly making it an impossible mission. 

However, perched atop the steep quarry walls were two perfectly sized replacement slabs, and, after some persuasion (from my faithful Strannik), they were on the back of my mobile crane before being slotted gently into place. Job’s a good ‘un.

Most missions are simple enough, then, but it’s less of a chore thanks to RoadCraft’s lovingly created environments. It’s cathartic at times, in a similarly chilled-out Snowrunner kind of way.

Hit the road

Now, the headline feature of RoadCraft is unsurprisingly its road-building, but it features less than you’d think in the early stages of the game. RoadCraft obliges you to create small sections of roads to progress, and you can choose whether your dump truck, bulldozer, paver and roller perform their respective tasks manually or automatically. 

It’s quicker to select the auto function, but way more fun to do it manually. You can even choose to cover the whole map in asphalt if you like, but your paved paradise is stymied by your dump truck’s proximity to a sand quarry.

Dump trucks can fill themselves with sand at the touch of a button as long as they’re within a certain distance of a quarry, with upgraded vehicles capable of extending this reach and payloads. The sand unloading physics are hugely satisfying to play with but many will be disappointed by the slightly immersion-breaking phantom sand.

It’s all worth it when you finally create your first billiard-table smooth surface, however.

Disaster never looked so good

RoadCraft looks incredible. From luscious vegetation swaying in the breeze, to silky water effects you can admire while your motor is drowning, RoadCraft looks very pretty indeed. 

Little details like water escaping from an exhaust pipe after a cold start, or tyres scrabbling for grip in a visibly viscous mud pit, immerse you in each of the game’s maps, emphasising both your isolation and the environment’s brutality.

These looks don’t seem to come at the cost of performance either, as the game ran flawlessly for me throughout my 25-hour+ playthrough even with the optional 4K Texture Pack installed (I have a mid-range gaming PC with an Nvidia GTX 4070, for reference). 

I did notice more cases of slowdown during multiplayer, however, so you may want to lower your graphics settings before heading online.

There’s dynamic weather and lighting, but no night-time sadly, with terrain becoming visibly more claggy as more vehicles pass over it.

Simulation theory

Those expecting a driving simulation along the lines of Snowrunner and MudRunner may be a little disappointed with RoadCraft. There’s no fuel to worry about, for example, which makes the game a more streamlined and arcadey experience (and arguably more fun as a result). 

Would the game be any better with fuel usage, though? In my opinion, no, since you need to chop and change vehicles so often. Constantly filling up would become rather tedious  – I mean, where am I going to find enough red diesel to keep my burgeoning fleet going?

For those confused by the jerry can symbol in the top-right of their screen, this denotes ‘recovery tokens’, which can be earned by completing career objectives. These can be redeemed via mobile bases (like the KHAN Lo “Strannik” tracked truck), allowing you to teleport vehicles to your current location. It’s a real time-saver.

There’s also no damage or manual gear shifting, which may upset Snowrunner aficionados but also appeal to more casual players. However, there are high and low-range gearboxes to switch between, as well as diff locking, which may placate some sim fans.

RoadCraft is compatible with steering wheels, and the Simagic Alpha Evo I’m currently testing was immediately mappable. However, my Moza mBooster brake, plus my CRP 2 gas and clutch pedals, were not picked up, so I couldn’t test this fully. 

Using a gamepad should be easier, especially considering the number of commands and fine controls RoadCraft’s vehicles require. 

Best get yourself a season pass for Diggerland, then.

Downsides

Although the game ran admirably well straight out of the box (side note: isn’t it amazing to see a driving game not releasing into early access?!) RoadCraft has some weaknesses.

One of your early missions involves setting up a transportation route between an abandoned facility and a phosphate plant. It’s absolutely torturous, with the route out of the facility filled with deep water, sticky mud and trees. 

My dim-witted, AI-controlled truck drivers constantly got stuck no matter how carefully I planned their route, leading me to plot a course straight through some trees. Eventually, the trucks bludgeoned their way through the foliage to their destination, but I’d lost a good hour of gameplay by that point. 

You’ll need to take extra care to ensure the routes you dispatch AI on are fully cleared of debris and deep mud, as THEY WILL GET STUCK. Thankfully, you can give them a little nudge to help them out, but they will require a lot of attention throughout the game.

I found that the game’s map became overwhelmingly muddled over time, too, with it becoming more and more difficult to ascertain exactly where you were going thanks to the multitude of markers and facilities clogging up the map. 

Occasionally, I also found the in-game camera selection to be quite limiting. There are three views: the obligatory swingman, a replay-style camera and a glorious cockpit cam. Often, the in-game camera would trip over itself (a health and safety strike if ever there was one), making it tricky to follow the action. Using cranes is fiddly enough as it is, after all. 

I’d also have loved to see a photo mode added – a game that looks this good deserves one.

RoadCraft is generally a bit vague in explaining objectives and how to complete them, with poorly laid-out menus clumsily confusing matters further. There is, at least, a handy Codex to help explain most of the basics.

Three’s a crowd, four’s better

Despite some frustrations, RoadCraft has an ace up its sleeve: four-player online co-op. Naturally, most games are more fun when shared with friends, but RoadCraft’s sometimes laborious processes can be streamlined with the help of your friends.

Or totally messed up, depending on their skills, but you’ll have a ton of fun regardless.

Trying to improve impassable sections of a map can be a frustrating experience solo, but with the support of friends, you can each wield a dump truck, bulldozer, roller and a paver, making light work of the worst of RoadCraft’s environments.

Then there’s the fun you can have with Saber’s proprietary physics engine, including picking up vehicles with a crane and swinging them about a bit, much to the annoyance of your friend in his inverted 4×4. You can also utilise the physics to right a toppled truck with a winch, or simply use a bulldozer to push one of your AI-controlled trucks up a hill. 

You can even have YouTube’s John Munro drop a log on you, the choice is yours… 

Multiplayer is available across PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S and PC versions of the game too, with full cross-platform compatibility. You can use your own career mode save or join one of your friend’s, seamlessly dropping in and out to offer assistance (or otherwise, as the case may be).

Just like previous Saber games, there is full mod support across PC and consoles, but we were naturally unable to test this ahead of the game’s release. Needless to say, many of the game’s foibles may well be addressed post-release thanks to the community.

Conclusion

Despite UI concerns and a lack of hand-holding, Saber has created a beautifully realised construction game with just enough vehicle simulation to endear it to hardcore fans.

Although its linear missions tend to fade into each other, at times the game calls on you to think outside the box, empowering players to harness RoadCraft’s fun physics and vehicle mechanics to produce novel solutions to problems.

Each environment is brutally realistic and stonkingly gorgeous to look at, with most of the game’s vehicles a joy to control.

It may not appease all of Saber’s fervent off-roading community, but RoadCraft has all the ingredients to be the surprise hit of the summer, especially when played with friends.

Score: 8/10

Fun construction sim enhanced by riotous multiplayer.

RoadCraft release date and price

RoadCraft will be available on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S and PC on the 20th May 2025.

RoadCraft Standard Edition is priced at £34.99 / 39,99€ / $39.99, with the Rebuild Edition, which includes extra vehicles and two extra maps, retailing for £44.99 / 49,99€ / $49.99. 

All players who pre-order the game will gain the Aramatsu BowHead 30T vehicle free of charge.