Teardown gets what makes Hollywood heists so thrilling

digitaltrends.com:

Who doesn’t love a Hollywood heist? No matter how absurd or unlikely they can be, I’ll always enjoy watching an elaborate movie caper that falls into place like a perfect puzzle. I’ve longed to play a video game that really captures that feeling, but games like Payday haven’t quite scratched the itch.

Teardown may be the first video game that actually gets what makes a movie heist so exciting. Developed by Tuxedo Labs, the indie title just got its official 1.0 launch this month – and it’s terrific. It may look like a Minecraft mod at first glance, but Teardown excels as a destruction sandbox, an ingenious puzzle game, and a thrilling action title all at once. It’s the closest I’ve seen a video game come to capturing the spirit of movies like Ocean’s 11.

Teardown’s campaign begins with a simple, unassuming mission. The main character, who runs a demolition company, gets tasked with destroying a building. It’s a simple tutorial that shows players that every piece of the blocky, voxel art environment can be broken.

There’s just one problem: The house they’ve been asked to destroy doesn’t actually belong to the person who contacted you, which sets off a war between anonymous rich clients who begin emailing the character with criminal requests. Players pop into different destructible levels to destroy safes, stealthily swipe documents, and steal cars.

Of course, no heist is that simple. The added twist is that stealing or destroying something usually results in an alarm being set off. Once it starts, players will have 60 seconds to finish their heist and jump into their escape vehicle before the cops arrive. That forces players to become Danny Ocean himself, as they must create elaborate plans to pull off a caper within an