Road 96 (2021) is a narrative adventure where you play a teenager trying to escape an oppressive, authoritarian country by reaching the border. Through a series of vignettes, you experience the most important and poignant parts on an epic road trip through a dangerous landscape. If you don’t make it to the border, you start again as a new teenager desperate for a way out, but the ramifications of your previous character choices persist. With thousands of possible paths, the decisions you make will have ripples that affect the world of Petria, creating a unique story of your journey towards freedom.

Play involves clicking to explore adventure scenes that range from walking around an area to riding in a vehicle. As you travel you encounter a colourful characters along the road, each with their own complex and compelling stories. You make decisions and advance the story by interacting with these people.

Unusually, these characters have a depth that takes multiple encounters to reveal. When you start as a new teenager, you can meet people from a fresh point of view and in completely different contexts which gives you a chance to talk about different topics and learn new information and perspectives.

The result is a fascinating experience where no two road trips are the same. Each trip, the scenes and characters you encounter are procedurally generated. The way you choose to make your way across Petria, and the friends you make along the way, nudge the various political and social factors in this tense, politically-charged society. As you do this you influence the world and everyone in it.

Road 96 Mile 0 is a separately purchasable prequel to the main game. It's a deeper look at two friends, Zoe and Kaito, from the main game who are from two different worlds and are unified by a powerful friendship. Their journey challenges their assumptions about money, happiness and friendship. Like the main game, your choices impact the outcome, here though there's am action element where you ride and dodge through levels to progress the story.

Each trip is an unforgettable journey of discovery and adventure. As you make your way down one of over 148,000 possible paths toward 20 endings you build the story one conversation, one action, one decision at a time.

Our examiner, Hannah Robertson, first checked Road 96 2 years ago. It was re-examined by Angela Hickman Newnham and updated 5 months ago.