Most of the time, Construction Simulator 2015 walks a very delicate line between frustratingly realistic and charmingly casual. Some missions drag on and on because equipment moves at real world speeds. Loading dirt into a container can take forever, for example, leaving you ready to hit the "montage" button and just get the day over with. There are a lot of smart menu features that keep the drudgery to a minimum (quick travel exists, thank the Maker), but there's still a necessary amount of grindy gameplay to keep the simulation experience alive.
Even though you have freedom to explore, Construction Simulator 2015 obviously wasn't intended to be Grand Theft Auto with forklifts. Collision detection is pretty iffy, especially when it comes to jumping. You can wiggle your way up towers and leap off without a scratch. (That's not a good or a bad thing, I just wanted to tell everyone I did that.) You can never tell when a piece of scenery will be solid or if you'll just pass right through. That's fine, I guess, you can't judge a game based on criteria it was never intended to fulfill. But the world is just so open, it beckons you to run around and stir up trouble, especially in co-op.
Co-op is the saving grace for Construction Simulator 2015. Running the construction company on your own puts an enormous amount of pressure on the game's creaky mission structure and repetitive tasks. But when you bring a friend along to play, suddenly you're having a great time. Loading a truck isn't frustrating because two people can tackle it together. When one person messes up, it's funny, not infuriating. Watching your pals jerk back and forth in construction vehicles as they try to figure out what the buttons to do is wonderful. And when they get used to the control schemes, you become a loading and building force to be reckoned with, which is also good!
One way co-op pushes Construction Simulator 2015 forward is the ability to delegate your own tasks. Everyone doesn't have to stand in the same area and focus on one thing. Load items in shifts, send one group off in the truck to carry half of the materials while the others load the second vehicle, that sort of thing. Construction Simulator 2015 doesn't always break things up into ideal co-op team packages, but if you work well together, you're in for a good time. The downside is the more people that play, the laggier things get. Stuttering screens are frustrating no matter what kind of game you're playing. Groups of two work fine, but four can cause problems on occasion.
Construction Simulator 2015 deals out a decent construction experience, but it's hard to ignore the various bugs and glitches you'll encounter during regular play. Things don't always go as expected. Everything from clipping through textures to teleporting materials and vehicles that get themselves stuck will plague your time with this game. It's what really keeps the experience from standing out as exemplary.
Verdict
Co-Op Score
Overall
The Co-Op Experience: Up to four players work on a construction crew together.
Co-Optimus game reviews focus on the cooperative experience of a game, our final score graphic represents this experience along with an average score for the game overall. For an explanation of our scores please check our Review Score Explanation Guide.