Pacific Drive Gameplay Trailer Review

Pacific Drive is a supernatural survival game where you drive a beat up old station wagon around the Pacific Northwest of the United States. This trailer was expertly made by Player One Studios. 

The trailer starts with a tilt down shot of a rainy night in the woods and presents the text: "IRONWOOD STUDIOS PRESENTS." This movie credits style treatment looks elegant and sets us up for something that looks and feels like a feature film more than what we'd typically expect of a gameplay trailer. I usually discourage most people from using a "[GAME STUDIO] Presents..." style intro because it's less effective when it's not a well established brand. I can't help but imagine an antagonistic audience reacting by thinking: "Who!? I don't care, just show me gameplay!" 

This is followed by a car driving. The "handheld" camera followed by an extreme closeup of the headlights creates a frantic and tense feel. I'm instantly envious of the debug camera options that must've been available to capture these shots which feel very grounded and "real." A huge difficulty in capturing for games is to make the cameras not look too "digital." One way to do that is for the camera to have more "weight" by either locking it down or making slower and subtler movements.

This is followed by a first person driving shot where some debris spews out of the ground, causing the driver to hit a tree. The view from inside the car lets us see some player-centric gameplay, which is nice to placate some of the "WHERE'S THE REAL GAMEPLAY!?" crowd. This concludes the Cold Open of the trailer and sets up the Introduction where...

We fade up to a shot of a garage. In hilarious fashion, the beat up car drives in. As Every Frame a Painting's video essay about Edgar Wright so astutely put it (quoting David Bordwell): "Things popping into frame are funny." On cue, the TV turns on and starts playing an orientation video about surviving in the exclusion zone. As described on the Player One Trailers website, the TV footage is custom designed and composited into the game scene, and the narration was specifically written for the trailer.

This shot is repeated for the comedic effect of saying: “YUP, BACK AGAIN!” and to show the start how the game loop repeats.

"While conducting your field research out in the Olympic Exclusion Zone, you may find conditions unkind to your personal transport unit. Steel and rubber in particular are extremely susceptible to zone conditions. In your toolkit, you have access to the basic equipment you need to maintain your transport."

This narration carries us through the initial repairs for the car and using tools to fix it up. This is seen mostly from the first person player perspective, but there are some cinematic accents like a closeup of the saw tool before the player picks it up. After the car is fixed, the camera slowly tracks left to set up the driver side door closing, followed by the headlight turning on, and the car driving back out. Pay attention to how restrained the camera movements are and the excellent composition of each action that occurs in the frame. This concludes the Introduction section of the trailer.

The Escalation starts with an establishing shot of the hazardous-looking atmosphere outside which shows how surreal the environment is. The wide bird's eye view of the car emphasizes how isolated and desolate the place is. The car driving past a completely gutted car frame highlights how much time has passed in this area and the apocalyptic vibes.

This could've been a driving shot with no floating rocks, but their inclusion gives us more information about the world.

The narrator continues by saying it's okay to "borrow" from things you find. This of course points to the common survival game mechanic of scavenging for resources, the player uses their saw to get materials from an abandoned car. We then see a robotic creature activate in the woods. Since we can hear the sound of the player's saw from a distance, we know this is nearby. Back from the player's perspective they hear an otherworldly sound but see nothing when they look up. Another bird's eye view again highlights their isolation before cutting to the player's perspective and seeing the robot creature suddenly fly towards them.

CUT TO: The car once again comically driving back into the garage. In a quicker montage, the car is fixed up once again. When the car drives back out we see them encounter more otherworldly creatures and hazards which is followed again by the car driving into the garage, fixing, and upgrading. I love how this loop of going out and upgrading is filmed. In each one we see a new part of the fix/upgrade process. At 1:36 there's a nice moment where the car is being patched up followed depth-of-field shot of the car's structure going from red status to green.

In the following loop we see some more footage of the player walking around outside their car exploring using flares and lanterns to light their way. The third person camera work of the car has great desperate energy which drives the feeling of encountering and escaping hazards.

The debug options must've included one where the camera is locked to the car but could be repositioned to a custom angle while the car is driving. The effect is similar to the “Snorricam” in live-action filmmaking where a camera is attached to the actor’s body.

There are only a few spots where the narration doesn't have a 1:1 connection to what we see. For example: "Do not attempt to detain or interact with the phenomena." happens during a fixing montage and no otherworldly stuff, but I understand if it was done that way because the structure of the trailer demanded to continue showing the loop there despite the narration moving on from talking about fixing/upgrading. Things get more and more intense until we reach the Climaxwhich starts with narration:

"Above all, do not forget the most important, critical rule: Do not get caught out in the Instability."

This is where there's a marked threshold between gradually increasing threats and upgrades to a: WHOOOOOOAAAAA moment. This is when the color palette shifts from blue to red, which really shows things are getting real. This is also where there's a content montage, concluding the trailer with the car driving out of the garage one last time as the training video concludes and turns off.

This gameplay trailer feels like it's a scene taken out of a bigger film, and yet it's also a tremendous showcase for the basic game loop and mechanics. I love the direction, cinematography, editing, and how well it works as a gameplay trailer. I'd love to know what debug tools were available to get all of these great shots. Anyone watching this will know exactly what to expect from the game, and any lingering questions like: "What does the HUD look like?" can be answered by clicking through store page screenshots. Super super good stuff. This will absolutely go one of my top favorite trailers of 2023!