Geometry Wars: Galaxies - 8/10
Geometry Wars – Galaxies
Toned down graphically, but addictive as ever.
By Matt Kelly
Note: If you've already checked out our other totally funky site, MyWii.com.au, a lot of this may seem familiar to you. The DS and Wii versions are essentially the same game, just on a different screen. Trying to decide which one to buy? Check out our review of the Wii version!
After much delay the arcade awesomeness has finally hit DS's in Australia. The Geometry Wars saga first began as an unlockable mini game in Bizzare Creations' Project Gothem Racing 2. Since then it was launched as it's own titile on Xbox Live Arcade under the name of Geometry Wars – Retro Evolved. While the original PGR version was still available (the retro part of it), the new Evolved mode turned it into a run away hit. Featuring the same basic gameplay concept, Evolved was redesigned with neon explosive pixel graphics, making taking out your polygon space enemies something like a blend between 80s arcade games and some kind of beautiful substance related experience without any of the horrible regretful come down.
And now in 2008 Kuju has given us Geometry Wars for both the Wii and the DS. Promising us pixel perfect recreation of the famed Evolved mode, and brand new arcade excitement and galactic conquest in the Galaxies mode, does this arcade tuned budget priced title deserve kudos?
So what the heck is Geometry Wars? Think a mix between arcade games such as Asteroids and Galaga. You find yourself in control of a small space ship with enemies spawning around you. These enemies take on various shapes and behaviors, from floating around aimlessly to more intelligent behaviors such as chasing you but dodging your shots when you fire back. There are numerous kinds of enemies, each having a separate behavior. When you've got 6 kinds after you, navigating between them and fighting them off can be very touch and go. Controlling your ship makes use of both the touch screen and the D Pad, using the D pad to move and the touch screen to blast the enemies in the direction of your choice. While it works well, this does suffer from big hands syndrome, in that holding the DS in one hand can get a little uncomfortable, especially as the you need a finger on the R button to activate your mega destruction bombs in a panic situation. If you found yourself in grief with something like Metroid Prime Hunters, expect to similar feeling with Geometry Wars.
It's a simple premise that Geometry Wars works on, destroy all enemies. But why it succeeds better than any other game out there that harks back to coin op arcade days is because it uses every available resource to ramp up the excitement up to big budget title level. Enemies are unpredictable, number in the dozens upon dozens and you will have your whole attention focused squarely on your ship. When you just manage to squeeze between two clusters on your last life, you will feel a moment of relief before the sweat inducing action continues. All this adds up to make the core concept of Geometry Wars heart pounding.
Kuju have given us a perfect DS-ised edition of the Evolved mode, but how does the new Galaxies mode fair? You'll find yourself in a kind of galactic conquest as you move between planetary systems in the Galaxies, each 'planet' features a different shaped play area (which can vary from a tiny box to a large maze system) and various sets of enemies. This is where you'll find the new enemies in the game, such as the huge hulking versions of familiar enemies that when shot, explode into dozens of smaller enemies which lunge at you, or high speed UFOs that dart across the planet at high speeds.
When destroyed the majority of enemies drop 'Geoms', a new element of gameplay which is basically money to unlock new galaxies and buy new skills for your drone. Geometry Wars fans will be saying 'Drone? What drone?' right about now. The drone is your intergalactic destruction buddy, a little object which follows you around during gameplay. You can skill up your drone with various behaviors varying from basic things like attacking your enemies to baiting your enemies away from you while you gun them down. Your drone also gains experience allowing it to do bigger and better things.
Geometry Wars on the DS features far more toned down graphics than its Wii or DS counterparts, everything is fairly low res and a large amount of the eye candy has been removed. Black Holes for instance generate a warping effect on the Wii, on the DS they just sprout a few particles. While none of this gets in the way of the gameplay, that particle fest graphic style is what sells Geometry Wars, and without it you're looking at something that resembles something of a previous era. You'll also find a much more limited view of the play area on the DS version. All of that said, the game still does very well given the limited hardware of the DS.
The audio of Geometry Wars really enriches the gameplay. All the sound effects play like updated 80s game sound effects. Sound effect use also serves the purpose of cueing you to whats going on in the game play. Exploding black holes, spawning enemies and other events in the game all have their own unique sounds that will let you know whats going on right across the battle. Given you're going to be squarely focused on your ship and what's trying to maul it, this is very helpful.
Music, again, sounds like a modern version of arcade video game tunes but its a bit more blippy than Geometry Wars fans are used to. Being fueled by the DS synthesizer, the music has no where near the phatness of its console counterparts. Combine that with the small selection of tunes and you may find yourself sick of it very fast. They still serve their purpose of adding pace to the game.
Finally, and something we don't get to talk about often in our reviews is the Wii/DS connectivity. If you own both a copy of the DS and Wii version of the game, you'll be able to hook them up and unlock the Lambda galaxy, a set of new planets with some insane difficulty. If you love Geometry Wars this will be a must have. If you're not, you've got enough galaxies to play through to keep you happy for a long time anyhow.
Summary:
Geometry Wars features the same intense gameplay that made it famous. While graphics and sound have been toned down for the DS the overall Geometry Wars experience is still there. Controls may give you a few issues if you're in the large hand camp but they as responsive as ever. Graphics have lost some the styled look that made the game famous but explosive pixels still abound.
Gameplay – 8.25
Addictive, challenging and so much to do. This game is going to find a place in all kinds of gamers hearts, and for its price tag is a really kick ass deal. Controls may give you grief.
Graphics – 7.0
A dumbed down version of the Geometry Wars look, doesn't take away from the gameplay but you may feel a little underwhelmed.
Sound – 7.0
Great sound design, somewhat repetitive music, but its a minor flaw.
Replay – 8.0
If you love the gameplay this is something you'll come back to again and again, it may be for 5 minutes, it may be for 5 hours as you try and beat out your high score competitor of the world WIFI score board.
Overall – 8.0
Geometry Wars - Galaxies is all class, at it's price it's really hard to fault it and even if you're not an arcade fan you're gonna have some love for this title. The graphics have been toned down for the DS version but at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter.
Submitted by Robtot
15/02/2008
25
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