Agent Intercept is a new spy car game from PikPok games (Wellington, NZ). For those who don’t know PikPok, they have developed many mobile games, games like the Flick Kick and Rival Stars series. Also Windows and PC games like Breakneck, Into the Dead and now Agent Intercept.
Last week during GDC, I had the chance to talk to Rick Stemm from PikPok (Narrative Designer of Agent Intercept). I have been playing the game for a couple of weeks now, so I had some questions about the game design, the story, the voice acting and so much more. You can see all of that below, on the Season 2 premiere of the myVGBC Podcast.
*I’m calling this episode 0 of Season 2, since episode 1 has already been recorded, and will be released in April.
Agent Intercept • The Game
Over the past few weeks, I’ve slowly made my way through the Agent Intercept campaign — one or two missions each night. There are a few ways to play this game. The campaign contains three chapters of five missions each. Each mission has five objectives, the main one being “complete the mission.” Without achieving that one objective you cannot move forward in the story. The cool thing is that even if you don’t complete the mission, you may still complete other objectives (high score, drifting challenge, point pickups) and get credit for doing so.
As a player you are free to dive as deep as you want into this campaign. You can either “complete each mission” and make your way through the story, or you can replay missions to unlock every objective and beat your high score. The game also includes two bonus modes: side missions and score attack. Side missions are new unlock-able missions to play through, while score attack gives you three new ways to enjoy the campaign missions (high score chase, target practice and time trials).
The controls are very simple (Steer, Boost or Fire Weapons), but also quite challenging. Even though it’s a pretty straightforward game, the story is what makes it unique. When I was finishing the fifth mission in Chapter One I felt like I knew what the rest of the game was going to be, but when I moved on to Chapter Two I was surprised by so much. With each chapter, Agent Intercept‘s story continues to evolve with twists and turns, new characters, weapons, vehicle mods and beautiful level design.
Influences
I talked to Rick about how the game gave me SpyHunter (the video game) vibes combined with a mix of James Bond and Austin Powers, what I didn’t think about until later was the show Archer (but a cleaner version). Rick mentioned the over-the-top stunts of recent Fast and the Furious films too. So, if you’re into any of these mentioned properties, you’ll most likely enjoy Agent Intercept.
I was surprised at the use of the haptic feedback and adaptive triggers on my PlayStation 5 DualSense controller. I guess I didn’t expect this game to have a full-on next-gen PlayStation 5 version to play. The art direction is simple, but the vibrant colors make the visuals stand out.
When I first started playing Agent Intercept, I could notice the heavy influence from mobile gameplay. There are games that feel like a mobile game was ported to a console, this feels different. This feels like the team took some of the normal mobile gameplay mechanics and tropes and sort of translated it to console.
Each level is full of fast-paced, over the top car chases blended with cutscenes featuring characters expanding on the story behind each chase. The camera also cuts away from the auto chase action to jump into giant explosions and set pieces — it’s an epic stunt show. Many levels even end with surprising “boss fight” scenarios, especially Chapter Two, Mission 1: Rocket Science. I have a full video of gameplay recorded, but I left the ending out of my interview with Rick, because it was too epic to spoil.
Throughout the campaign you get to meet and interact with new spy friends on different missions. Just don’t get too comfortable, because you never know who’s a double or even triple agent.
Agent Intercept is out now on PC, Nintendo Switch, Xbox and PlayStation consoles (Current and Next-Gen).
*myVGBC.com was provided an Agent Intercept game review code for PlayStation 5 from the publisher.
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