TIME e3 2014  What It’s Like to Play Sunset Overdrive, the Xbox
One’s Cartoon-Violent Exclusive Shooter  Pulling off extreme
acrobatics while blasting mutant hordes is trickier than it
looks, but maybe that's the idea.  In the hands of a skilled
player, Sunset Overdrive is a beautiful sight. Effortlessly, the
player bounces from car hoods to rooftops, gliding on banisters
and leaping into the air, firing every manner of explosive,
colorful weaponry at the scrambling, screaming mutants below. In
a flash, they become a dazzling display of pyrotechnics and
orange gore.  This was not quite my experience when I first
played the game for myself at E3 2014. A perfect example of the
disconnect between scripted presentations (like the one at
Microsoft’s press conference) and hands-on demos, I immediately
found myself on the ground and surrounded by mutants, failing to
grasp the “traversal” system that lets players bounce and slide
from one platform to the next. Moments later, I was dead.  But
maybe quick punishment wa