Subway Surfers —— A Classic that Never Fails to Entertain You’ve been caught red handed. Evading moving trains while dodging all manner of obstacles is your only way to safety. Do you have what it takes to escape capture while grabbing whatever you can along the way? Subway surfers is one of those games that a lot of people have played since it was released in 2012. When we say a lot, we mean a lot. The data’s a bit stale, but the game surpassed Three Billion downloads as of August 2020. That’s almost half of the world's population in downloads. This, of course, doesn’t mean half of the world has played the game, but it does make it safe to say that most people have seen the game or know of it. There are a lot of endless runners out there. One that springs to mind is Temple Run. The idea is simple enough really. Run. Endlessly, or as close to endlessly as you can manage. Endless runners are the kinds of games you can easily pick up and not realise you’ve passed a few hours playing. Subway Surfers is no different, in fact we’d argue it’s even more difficult to put down than some of the others out there. You start out playing as Jake, but can quickly unlock a variety of other surfers. There is a character to match any personality and it can take some time to unlock your favourite one. The game is seriously smooth and from the very first time you try to escape the pesky train inspector, you’ll fall in love with how easy and intuitive the controls and movement are. The good There’s so much to love about this game. One of the cornerstones of this game is just how simple it is. There’s not much you need to learn to get going. The controls are unbelievably simple and intuitive and can be learned within your first session. The more “challenging” aspects to the game become clearer with each run you go on and you should understand everything within no time. Besides the easy controls, you’ll quickly notice how fluid the gameplay feels. It is really satisfying to successfully dodge an obstacle at the last second or pull off a daring combination of jump slide dodges. Not to mention how satisfying it is to hop onto your hoverboard and cruise through the game at break-neck speeds. The game does a really good job of immersing you in the action. One other great aspect to the game is the progression system in Subway Surfers. It is well thought through and intentional. You’ll get a taste of some of the juicy power ups available in the game as you go along, and see just how beneficial they can be to you if you upgrade them. It’s also great to see a lack of “pay to win” in the game. Sure, you can pay to expedite upgrades and get access to more skins quicker, but you don’t need to spend a cent to enjoy this game to its fullest. Couple this with great seasonal events and you’ve got a rich experience that changes frequently for the wonderfully low price of absolutely nothing. The bad Unfortunately, a failing of this genre is replayability. The run, die and run again gameplay can quickly become tedious and even though you’ll be progressing towards new goals each run, it is possible that a session can be cut short out of disinterest in continuing. After all, there’s not much variance to an endless runner where you’re dodging trains and train-related obstacles. Once you’ve jumped over one train, you’ve pretty much jumped over every train. This is not to say you won’t want to come back, just sometimes you might get a little fatigued along the way. You also simply can’t look past the barrage of adverts you’ll need to wade through during a session. Yes, we know, a lot of mobile games are worse, but Subway Surfers does not hold back either. There’s nothing more annoying than being on a high after a particularly great run and then being served an advert about something you could care less about. Adverts are the necessary evil of the industry, sure, but man they can be annoying at times. The ugly Probably the most ergregios thing to be found in the world of Subway Surfers is bugs and glitches. There have been few occasions where progression is totally lost, and most people who have encountered this have uninstalled and moved on, understandably. Others have reported issues with hitting obstacles when they were sure they had moved on time, or other obstacles not registering at all. Safe to say that these reports are few and far between with a game this polished, but it is worthwhile mentioning. Closing All things considered, if you’re a fan of playing games on your mobile device then Subway Surfers is a safe bet. It’s a game where you can have a great time and kill a few good hours while doing so. If you have some experiences with the game or want to share how badly you’re thrashing your friends that play the game with you, why not leave a comment. Alternatively if you don’t agree with something we’ve said, feel free to reach out. We’re here to create great content and appreciate all input we can get.