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Overdrive City Beginner’s Guide: Tips, Cheats & Strategies to Become a Top Car Tycoon

Whether you are a casual gamer or a hardcore enthusiast, if you have been playing mobile games for quite some time, chances are that you have played and enjoyed several, or at least one, of Gameloft’s games. Being a pioneer in the mobile gaming industry, Gameloft has continuously been developing hit titles since 2010 and has grown their app portfolio to include more than 60 games and spans across various genres. Asphalt 8: Airborne and Modern Combat 5 are just some of Gameloft’s most popular titles, each with at least 100 million downloads earned from the Google Play Store alone and each one along with most of Gameloft’s releases have enjoyed largely positive reviews from its users.

Overdrive City – Car Tycoon Game, or simply Overdrive City on the Apple App Store, is Gameloft’s latest racing / city-building simulator on mobile. As a unique mix of both genres, Overdrive City is ideal for car enthusiasts who are not much into the driving aspect of games and enjoy the collecting, manufacturing, and trading side more. There is a bit of racing involved, which can be done on auto play, and there are upgrades and customizations available for each car as well.

The game sets you up to manage your very own city dedicated to cars. The central aspect of the game revolves around manufacturing parts for cars, with the most basic ones being an ingredient as well to producing other parts. The same parts can be used to upgrade the cars you own and also service other cars to earn keys and experience points.

overdrive city tips

You need keys to participate in racing events to earn blueprints needed to unlock better cars. As your inventory grows, you will naturally have more than enough of some parts while lacking in others. In such cases, as well as to secure some cars or parts you have yet to unlock, you can freely trade with other players.

Overdrive City is very easy to pick up and play. While it presents some concepts and mechanics which may be new to some players, the in-game tutorial and guide that is provided whenever you unlock some new features, are very easy to follow. The auto mode in racing can be of great help especially to new and inexperienced racing game players and while racing only requires you to time your acceleration and brakes, auto mode does both those functions well. If you are looking to grow your city more efficiently, then check out our Overdrive City beginner’s guide, as it comes with loads of tips, cheats and strategies to help you become a top car tycoon!

1. Always Be Productive

Although city-building simulation games are often tied into idle clicker mechanics, the disparity in production output between actively playing and offline processing in Overdrive City is tremendous. With the most basic parts creatable in 2 minutes, you can only imagine how much less you will get if you go offline in 30 minutes. With limited storage capacity and a dynamic market for parts you can manufacture, a close, hands-on approach is the best one to employ to ensure a quick turnover of parts and profits.

how to be productive in overdrive city

You should always go for mass-producing parts that can be manufactured fast and save the ones that take longer to finish for when you are about to go offline. As soon as you can, take note of the required parts that you need to produce the more complex ones and ensure, as much as possible, that you always have one in stock. The storage space limit will be a bit of a burden early on so work on upgrading it whenever you can. Parts needed to increase storage space can be obtain from mission rewards as well as watching some video ads.

On your first few hours in the game, you should check on production in-between races. Although it can be very tempting to proceed to the next challenge as soon as you beat the current one, tapping on the home button and scanning through your city for production outputs will take less than a minute. The idea is to ensure that each production facility will have a full queue before you leave it alone. Another thing to consider is that as you make progress and reach new levels enough to produce new parts, it only means that you will have more to balance as far as production and inventory is concerned.

There won’t be a perfect scenario where what you have in stock and what you need for further production, car servicing, or even personal upgrades are perfectly in tune. As such, a prioritization or focus in terms of which to go for should be set in mind first. As you make new friends and trade buddies in Overdrive City, securing the parts you need when you need them will be a lot easier.

2. Balance Between Servicing And Upgrading

Tending to your customers in the service center and tending to your own car collection are both important, continuous tasks in Overdrive City. Servicing the cars of your customers earn you keys, among other things, which are needed for you to be able to participate in races and trials. Of course, the same parts are needed for your own cars so you can stay competitive in the races and trials.

how to balance between servicing and upgrading in overdrive city

As neither of these tasks are more important than the other we simply cannot recommend that you focus on one more than the other. The rolling idea, therefore, is to balance activities and parts allocation for both, naturally depending on what you need more. If your cars have more than what it takes to take on the next racing or trial challenge, then prioritize your customers’ needs for keys. If you are lagging behind in your cars’ power levels and need to upgrade them, then focus on allocating the parts they need for some upgrades.

3. Concentrate On Collecting Specific Blueprints

Relative to the above, do not feel that your initial cars can be ignored whenever you obtain a new car within the same group that has more power. Keep in mind that as you collect more of the same blueprints for cars you already own, they can be upgraded to a higher tier that comes with a huge boost in performance.

overdrive city blueprints

As you continue to engage in races, each one you successfully beat earns you research points on top of experience and blueprints. Although most of the rewards will only be earned on the first successful completion, replaying any of the levels you beat can still earn you those points.

Once you unlock the research center, research points that you earn from your racing career, the race trials, or the truck depot can be used to purchase the blueprints you need. Only a select number of cars are available based on your level but the blueprints for sale refresh every once in a while. Simply stick with one blueprint you need the most depending on whether you are going for the better car or the one you are close to completing.

4. Keep Your City Tidy

Reaching new levels in Overdrive City often comes with new facilities to place on your growing land. As you may likely place new structures wherever they can fit, you will soon find yourself scrambling across the city whenever you are searching for a particular structure. If not laid out properly enough as well, it will be a lot more challenging to monitor idle production lines.

overdrive city strategies

As you would naturally want a more efficient production and processing line within your city, you should spend time early on to relocate some structures, edit the roads and lands, and even remove boulders and trees that hinder territorial expansion. Removing blockades as such may take some time as you will need specific tools like chainsaws, axes, and jackhammers. In any case, you can get those items from missions, level up rewards, as well as through random bonuses from production and customer servicing.

As a general rule, tying in production facilities close to one another will be the most efficient way to go, reserving spaces as well for future expansions or copies of the same facility. Altering the lay out of your city will not incur costs as well so go crazy and renovate as much as you want.

5. Racing On Manual Can Be Better

Proceeding through the racing career and the race trials can be mostly accomplished on auto mode and with the speed boost on, it becomes three times more convenient. If you have played any other game that has a built in auto mode, however, you should know that manual controls will always be better given the effort you exert in doing so.

overdrive city tricks

Despite the simple hold and release controls of Overdrive City to accelerate and brake while you race, it can still be a challenge for some players, especially total beginners. Banking on auto driving, on the other hand can bring success especially when your car’s power meets or exceeds the recommended level.

While this is mostly true in the race career, the racing trials are far more challenging for auto mode players. You can complete some of the challenges when you meet the suggested power levels but not in all cases. It may even happen that you secure a win and yet not be able to obtain all the rewards in a given stage. As this will be a common experience moving further through the ever-increasing levels of challenge, it is best for you to begin practicing racing manually early on. As an added tip, you can focus on the mini map and time your brakes before hitting the corner instead of watching the actual race itself. Focusing on the track layout will give you more time to react to curves ahead of the track.

6. Add Friends For Trading

As we mentioned earlier, even a fully optimized production plan in Overdrive City can still leave you to have an overflow of some parts and a shortage on others. This is largely due to the unpredictability of customer needs you encounter via your service center. Likewise, balancing between servicing other cars and tending to your own will make it a challenge for you to perfectly have in stock what you need to provide for both.

overdrive city trading tips

Although you can definitely make progress in Overdrive City playing entirely on your own, adding as many friends as you can will boost your efficiency as far as obtaining the parts you need and disposing of overabundant ones are concerned. You will start off having an NPC friend, Henry, who will always have some parts available for you to purchase when you need them. Once you have progressed enough and unlock the motor magazine structure that showcases what other players are putting up on sale, you can purchase some immediately needed materials from them using gold.

You can view other players’ cities and invite them as friends via the friend request button at the lower right side of the screen. Alternatively, you can also add friends through Facebook. Having more friends does not just give you sources of extra materials and resources you may need immediately. Doing so also opens up more channels for you to dispose of extra items you have an abundant supply of.

On top of faster growth and progress brought about by having items you need when you need them, Investing time in trades also help ease down requirements for expanding your warehouse to contain your growing number of parts and items. Be sure to keep your store shelves full as you will never know what other players will need.

7. Spend Your Cash Wisely

In addition to gold coins that stand as your basic currency in Overdrive City, cash serves as the premium currency that is far more difficult to obtain and is needed for a whole lot of functions. For one, cash can be used to speed up production in any facility. Cash also serves as the all-in-one quick alternative for parts and coins you may need to perform some upgrades. Most importantly, cash serve as the only means for you to be able to expand queue slots in the production line.

how to spend cash in overdrive city

Given the scarcity of cash, the challenge in obtaining them, and the multiple functions they are used for, it becomes necessary to learn how to manage them well and avoid spending them indiscriminately. To be sure, prioritize investing your cash in purposes that offer no alternative means of achieving. Given the above uses of cash, therefore, it would be wise to exclusively spend them for adding extra queue slots for your production lines.

8. Accomplish Missions For Extra Rewards

Especially on the early stages of the racing career, practically every race nets you rewards. Every successful production, sale, and even service you provide also comes with remuneration that contributes to your progress in Overdrive City. Beyond all that, however, there are extra rewards to be earned from completing objectives via the achievements menu. The objectives you will see all relate to the activities you engage in as you play the game and, for the most part, will serve as a guide to steer you towards what you may be missing on your daily grind.

overdrive city achievements

Reaching new levels will unlock more objectives for you to accomplish and new ones come in threes. Each objective is likewise 3-tiered with the next one being available once you accomplish the current one. It is fairly easy to miss knowing when you have already met an objective and rewards are available for claiming. Be sure to check for notification icons on your structure with the huge star emblem regularly.

9. Regularly Check And Accomplish Truck Orders

overdrive city truck orders

Manufacturing whole cars can take a lot of time and resources. However, the payoff you get out of a successful truck order completion can boost your overall progress tremendously. Coins, XP, and research points can be earned by completing truck orders. You will be able to unlock more order slots as well every 5 levels you reach.

10. Earn Extra Rewards From Cars and Video Ads

If you occasionally enjoy idly watching your city as cars drive around it, be sure to tap on blue gift boxes and price tag icons whenever you see them. Gift boxes provide instant rewards while price tags open a quick deal to give you gold for some parts you have.

overdrive city rewards

As far as in-game ads go, there are no random ads that pop up in Overdrive City as you play. There are ads you can watch voluntarily and for the most part, you would surely want more of them to become available. Be on the lookout for “play” icons on the Ad Truck structure. Playing a 15 to 30-second video here will net you cash or other useful rewards that are difficult to obtain anywhere else. The bigger help you can get out of playing ads comes with production and even building construction.

Whenever you are producing something that takes a long while to complete, playing a video ad can cut down completion time by 30%. This will be a huge help once you start putting up structures that manufacture cars as these take several hours to complete.

That sums up all the tips and strategies we have for you on our Overdrive City – Car Tycoon Game Beginner’s Guide. We certainly hope that you enjoyed reading our guide and that the topics we discussed helped you understand the game’s features and mechanics better as well as improved your car city management proficiency.

Again, we would like to stress out that spending a little more time playing than being off and away from the game will contribute greatly to your progress although on its own, playing leisurely and enjoying the game without pressure works fine as well. If you have discovered tips or tricks of your own in addition to what we have presented or have some aspects of the game you need help with, do not hesitate to let us know!