Switch to: German
In this surreal adventure, we use our trusty Vespa to help people in need and come to terms with our own past.
A Pizza Delivery was developed by Eric Osuna and it’s now available via Dolores Entertainment for €13.99/£11.79/$13.99 on Steam and the Microsoft Store for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S (currently 20 percent off on Steam, Xbox, and for PlayStation Plus members). Thanks to its participation in the Xbox Play Anywhere program, the game can be played on both an Xbox Series console and a PC after purchasing it from the Xbox Store.
Initially, B – dressed to kill all in purple to match her similarly colored Vespa – attempts to deliver a pizza to Ben in an apartment building with striking wallpaper, but he absolutely refuses to open the door. We can either accept this or try again. We get repeatedly to pick a line of dialogue in the game, and depending on what we choose, we might get additional info, but these decisions don’t seem to have any more influence on the course of the story. After dropping the pizza in front of the apartment door by using the triangle button, we notice the antique clock on a shelf by the window – one of numerous objects that seem to be connected to us and remind us of days gone by, be it our parents’ favorite record or our niece’s pacifier. As we leave the apartment complex, we realize that we’re in the middle of nowhere. A nearby public phone rings and our boss Earl assigns us our next delivery. This feels a bit like a spin-off starring the Pizza Dude in Hotline Miami. A Pizza Delivery takes us to imaginatively designed locations such as a gloomy city where we get covered in ash as soon as we sit down on a bench, a cemetery situated in a picturesque coastal area, and a factory complex illuminated by the Northern Lights.
The areas are connected by seemingly endless tunnels or supernatural portals. Sometimes it sounds like someone’s (un)plugging an AUX cable from an amplifier – weird. We’re usually zipping around on our versatile Vespa, but every now and then we have to dismount to solve a few puzzles, like finding levers and using them in the right spots to drain water or to activate conveyor belts to transport our pizza while we squeeze through narrow passages. The delicious disc mustn’t get too wet, however, so we have to place the pizza on the conveyor belt at just the right moment while it’s protected from the rain by a box above it, or we make use of hatches and shelters. In another area, we have to crack a password and use a starfish in the correct sequence of movements. These environmental puzzles manage to add variety to the gameplay, though they’re quite easy and there aren’t too many of them.
On our journey, we find mementos, diary pages from other pizza delivery drivers and up to eight music boxes, which all seem to play the same melody. The game’s atmospheric soundtrack was created by LaFrancesssa. Although the environments are full of interesting details – for example, when we spot a giant “GO ANYWHERE !” sign in the sky while numerous stop signs block our path –, they sometimes feel a little too empty and bleak. The conversations with our customers are entertaining and repeatedly touch upon interesting topics. For instance, on the roof of the abandoned factory building, we meet Pora, a red-haired woman covered in freckles and tattoos, who isn’t on the best of terms with her parents because she doesn’t meet their expectations. At the beach, we decide to skip stones by engaging in quick-time-events with a guitar-playing wanderer with a red mane to forget his worries. By delivering a slice of pizza, albeit dry and ice-cold, we get to learn more about each of the game’s characters and briefly provide them with relief. However, there’s only a handful of characters in the game, and after an hour – or less – it’s already over.
A Pizza Delivery uses a mostly colorful comic artstyle, and characters, animations and environments look decent. However, some details, such as grass and leaves, visibly pop into existence before our eyes, and we can repeatedly and unintentionally clip through a couple of objects. While exploring on foot, the game mostly maintains a stable frame rate on PS5 Pro – it looks like 60 frames per second – but as soon as we press the accelerator on our Vespa and rotate the camera, the movements no longer feel so smooth. Either the frame rate starts to drop noticeably, or the frame pacing is just inconsistent. However, this isn’t too much of an issue, since we don’t really need to rotate the camera very often due to the mobility of our primary method of transportation.
Final thoughts
A Pizza Delivery is an interesting narrative adventure game that consistently manages to surprise us and keeps trying to woo us with its charming presentation. The game manages to touch upon interesting topics time and time again, although the decently written dialogues aren’t voiced. We would have liked to see more of them and in turn traded some of the empty game world for it. The game isn’t too ambitious in terms of gameplay. The Vespa is easy to control and the puzzles are a pleasant change of pace, though pretty easy, and a nice way to get to the next striking location. After only an hour, this creative journey of self-discovery is already over and it offers a satisfying ending, even though some questions remain unanswered. Pizza lovers and those who enjoy strange tales can certainly treat themselves to this short but sweet delicacy, while everyone else is able try the free demo first.
Dolores Entertainment provided us with a copy of the game for PS5, which we used to capture the screenshots on PS5 Pro.
