Press release photo from the Bus Simulator 18 DLC

I ride the bus every single day, so when I saw that there was a game to try to be a bus driver I was overjoyed.

Bus Simulator 18 takes place in a zone with large cities and smaller local towns within the wilderness. It has a little less of the simulator aspects found in other driving simulators (such as gas, rest for the driver, etc.) but still features its own mechanics that make it interesting. As the driver you are in charge of giving out tickets, following a strict schedule of picking up and delivering passengers, and must follow the rules of the road in the given area you are in. The base game is $34.99 and the DLC (which will release on May 22nd) is $15.99.

A lot of the mechanics are repetitive but enjoyable. You constantly need to check passenger tickets to see if anyone is trying to fare dodge (as some buy from you while others just walk on). This can be especially difficult on a very full bus, as passengers get annoyed if you ask more than once to check their ticket. That’s where that mechanic stops unfortunately, and I think it’d be interesting if repeated prodding makes a passenger leave the bus or punishes the driver in some way. Some passengers may be listening to loud music, which is a prompt for you to step away from the drivers seat and ask them to stop. I have yet to find a way to do this without randomly stopping in the middle of the road, because if you wait until the next bus stop and they get off you are penalized. Sometimes passengers left items that you’d need to pick up and deliver to them off the bus. Unfortunately, I think this was bugged as I was never able to pick up the item to return it to the owner and therefore was always penalized. While not a mechanic, the people on the bus often talk and chat throughout the ride. At first it was cute, but then they repeated the same exact jokes and phrases multiple times in a single trip and I was forced to mute all of them. Hopefully none of them had a major issue with my driving because I had a lovely, silent trip.

The scenery of Bus Simulator 18 is really lovely and definitely the highlight of the game. The main game gives you two larger zones to move through, a suburban area in the forest, and two industrial zones to the East. There is enough variation in the scenery to create a lot of different routes, and you as the main driver can pick and choose which route you want every shift (so even if repetitive, you have a choice). The DLC that launches tomorrow opens up a new mountainous region that is beautiful (and features some very unique and cute homes!) as well as another small city and the airport. The DLC really opens up the world of the game to more options for routes, especially since the airport can connect to so many of the zones from the main game. You as the main driver set the different routes and can assign employees and buses to drive them to earn more money for your company. You also are able to customize all of the buses you drive, which is a really enjoyable way to let the game feel more personal (all my buses are blue and awesome).

The driving of the game is probably the most fun aspect of the game, and also the most difficult. Once you upgrade into larger buses, it becomes very challenging to turn and move throughout the game (especially in the new mountain zone of the DLC). I like the penalties that one receives for breaking the law (such as going through a red light, or speeding in a zone), but I feel like it’s missing quite a bit in this area. I am able to move my bus into the opposing lanes to skip traffic without any penalty at all, and am even able to fit my bus in-between cars on either side of the road with no penalty. Only a few areas of the game have stop lights, so it can be very difficult to understand right of way in certain moments (especially while waiting in a traffic line behind other cars when you aren’t sure when they can turn). Since the game relies heavily on the driver keeping track of time to reach their destination, this can be very frustrating.

I wish the game had a manageable calendar that showed when holidays were happening, or gave the option of randomized weather forecasts. On holidays more people ride the bus, but I often found out without warning and sometimes regretted the route I took (since I could have earned more money on a different route that day). I also encountered a bug twice that is fairly game breaking: sometimes, I would randomly be penalized for ‘hitting a pedestrian’ when there were no people in sight. This leads to a 20,000 euro fine, which would make any trip fall into the negative of money earned so I was forced to quit the game and restart. Hopefully this is something they are aware of and looking to fix.

Bus Simulator 18 for the most part is pretty relaxing and mindless, which makes it a good simulator in my book. Some of the bugs can be pretty frustrating and the rules of the road a bit hard to follow, but if you take it slow there are a lot of beautiful places to explore in a big ol’ bus. It is quite expensive for the amount of content it provides in my opinion, but if this is the type of game you enjoy I think it fits well with other games in the simulator genre. I do think the DLC adds quite a bit to the game with large areas to explore, so if you have the base game already I highly recommend adding in the DLC to your mix of routes to drive.

Happy travels!

Disclaimer: I was provided a game key and DLC key for Bus Simulator 18 from Homerun PR.