The evil ghost lorry in Truckful’s demo nearly ate me and the lady who did a headstand in my bed

We survived, in spite of my driving skills

Image credit: MythicOwl

Drive faster, she screams as a cacophony of meepy noises, it’s coming! I know, headstand lady, I know, comes my response from behind the wheel. We’d be safe if I hadn’t botched one of the switchbacks and gently skidded into a low wall. I’d best put my foot down if I want to escape the demo of mysterious delivery driver Truckful without finding out what happens when a little truck is swallowed by a bigger truck.

Truckful Demo Trailer – MythicOwl (Pocketpair Publishing)

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This is the sort of mystery promised by Truckful’s trundling down otherwise picturesque forest lanes and tracks. Another mystery is how you, the player, ended up permanently stuck in the cab of a plucky little pickup. The game tries to play that one one off as a joke. To be fair, the pretty brief and linear demo is keen to get on with the quick slice of a day and night’s trucking it offers to delve too deep into any mysteries just yet.

Assuming the rest of the game follows suit, your time when the sun’s up in Truckful is spent making deliveries to various locations. I had to pick up a lady called Rotti whose van had broken down. I pulled up behind it and loaded both her and her cargo into my pickup’s bed. There’s some nice physics stacking to packing seven objects into just four slots, and amid the precarious balancing I discover that I can flip items upside down. I have to pack Rotti in the back too, so decide to plonk her on her bonce. She doesn’t seem to mind.

Truckful’s side-on camera and narrow, windy roads aren’t too challenging when your only obstacle’s the occasional herd of sheep blocking the road, but they are tricky enough to punish carelessness. My racing instincts kicked in at one point while descending a hill, and the resulting bunch of flowers sent flying from the truck bed instantly failed the mission and sent me back to the previous roadside checkpoint.

Delivering the goods to an old lady’s garage was repaid by her restoring the truck’s lights and horn, allowing myself and Rotti to venture out into the night. Rotti now elected to sit the right way up and in the passenger seat, which I found slightly disappointing. Just as the darkness was making the game’s chill woodland vibes really sing, a great noise erupted behind us. A haunting horn, somewhere between an air raid siren that needs to blow its nose and a cargo ship’s mournful cry. The ghost truck. Despite the need to haul ass making the flowing turns even tougher to thread through, I was on track to easily outrun the beast until the mistake. The fact I survived and was able to re-open a gap pretty rapidly on the way out of the woods maybe suggests the revenant rig will need to up its game to be a threat.

This was only a short taste of Truckful though, so there’s every chance it does. I’ve come out of it still in two minds as to whether the game’ll have much to offer in terms of in-depth mysterious substance beyond the initial spectral semi intrigue, but what I’ve played certainly wasn’t lacking in charm or chill driving atmos.

Truckful’s set to release in 2026, and you can find this new demo on its Steam page.