Dark Souls Who?
I am a quivering mess. Shaking, dribbling and muttering to myself. This is the effect Velocibox is having on me. A Rush Runner style game, Velocibox starts as it means to go on, at 150mph.
The premise here is simple; guide a cube along a track littered with walls and barriers, all while collecting smaller cubes that allow you to progress to the next level. The challenge comes from the speed at which this cube is travelling. After a very brief tutorial that lays out the controls and gameplay, players are thrown in to the game full on. Prepare to die… thousands of times.
MSRP: $12.49
Platforms: PS4
Price I’d Pay: $12.49
Multiplayer: No
The game does an excellent job with its graphic and sound design to make sure all the player has to do is concentrate on the road ahead. The visuals are very sharp and colourful, so I could always tell what obstacles lay ahead and it used audio cues to let me know how far away I was from reaching the next level. But this is all the help the player is going to get. With each passing level a new arrangement of barriers is introduced; but don’t worry, players will soon get used to them as they fail over and over again. The trick is to memorise the arrangement of each level and try, try again.
The game is never at fault when failing; it’s all on the player. It’s never cheap or unfair, and every time I died I knew it was from my lack of hand/eye coordination and poor controller skills. It meant that I was never angry at the game for my mistakes and as the game can be restarted at just the tap of a button, I was straight back in the action. This is Dark Souls with added Techno Pop. You can even check out statistics from the menu and see how many restarts have been used. Very cruel.
There are eight bone-crushing levels in the main game and a ranked mode. Beat the main levels and a new mode opens up, Super Velocibox. This is exactly as it sounds, eight more levels, just even faster and harder. In Ranked mode the player has to play all eight levels in one life, which to me is seemingly impossible. Scores are placed in a global leaderboard for everyone to see, even if I only made it through 10 seconds of the level.
Velocibox walks that fine line between incredibly frustrating and frustratingly replayable. It is unforgiving and brutal in its design; but at the same time induces that ‘One more go’ feeling. This game is not for the faint of heart, or those that have slower than lightening fast reactions. But if you crave a simple, fast paced and demanding challenge, then this game may be right up your alley.
Review copy of game provided by publisher.
