Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved Reviews

  • Removed Gamer
    Gamer has been removed
    20 0 0
    Geometry Wars was the first game I ever had the pleasure of playing on the 360 back in 2007. Having heard of the game from Project Gotham Racing, I was immediately taken in by its fast-paced gameplay, it's amazing colours, it's thumping soundtrack, and serious level of difficulty. I popped my first achievement with this game and thus began my whoring for any achievement I could sink my teeth into. I figured it was about time to give this game a proper review!

    Because there's no story to speak of, I'm skipping that section and drifting right into the gameplay. All you need to have for this game is a thumb on each hand and a trigger finger for those all-important, level-clearing bombs. Your left stick steers while your right stick aims and fires your weapon at a constant pace. You start off slow, working through ninja-star-looking enemies and simple blue shapes, slowly progressing passed the elusive greens and heat-seeking pinks into snakes, black holes, mirror-imaged ships, and the ridiculously tiny and plethorial mini-baddies! Enemies pop into existance like crazy, causing you to evade, dodge and run away like a group of knights searching for the Holy Grail only to come across French cow-flinging soldiers!

    It's action-packed, fast-paced, and heart-attack-inducing! You can only run and shoot for so long before that trigger finger itches and you just need a half-second of relief. Surviving is tough! Unless you have some outstanding coordination, expect to die. A lot!

    Gameplay: 9 out of 10

    To look at, the game takes simple, hollow shapes, splashes them in more neon than an 80s dance party, and throws them against a mind-bending graph background that bends and shapes with the motion. It's simplistic yet more than effective in its impact. Considering all the action you see on the screen at once, you'll have to appreciate the beauty of the images while watching someone else!

    Sound effects play a huge part in the game, telling you which enemy has just popped up off-screen. Each enemy has a distinctive sound to signify your next move, though once you get later into the game and are just fending for your life, sound really doesn't exist. The only thing there is is panic and white noise occupying your brain.

    The music is repetitive but catchy enough to not be repetitively annoying. I enjoy listening to the game and have since 2007.

    The Look and Sound: 10 out of 10

    Achievements are structured in a 75/25 system, from the looks of many scores I've seen: 75% of the achievements are fairly easy to attain, while the other 25% are difficult and require the maximum amount of effort, skill and patience. Enjoy your hunting for the first group and have fun with the game. Considering how ramped-up the difficulty gets just minutes in, survivng to 500,000 points or, unimaginably, 1 million is an endeavour in of itself.

    The game, even if you've hit the max achievements, you'll still want to play the game and have a blast!

    Replay Value: 10 out of 10

    Overall, this game is easily the best bang-for-your-buck XBLA game ever created. Sure, there are free games that give you an easy 250 points, but they don't have the style, the excitement, or the enjoyment that this game holds!

    Overall: 9.5 out of 10
    Achievements:
  • Removed Gamer
    Gamer has been removed
    18 8 10
    Set as a 2D space fighter, you play as the "U" (as you see in the icon for Geometry Wars Evolved) and must fight through wave after wave of increasingly difficult enemies, so many that they spawn back every second if you get far enough! You have 3 bombs that wipe out all enemies at one time and 3 lives incase you die! You gain back a bomb at 75k points and a life at 100k points.

    This game will test your reactions and also your mental endurance. So many enemies at one time can mess with your mind a bit, but in the good way. headspin You need fast reflexes with the controller and a good mind to figure out where your going to survive long enough to the highest achievement of surviving till 1,000,000 points.

    This is a great game for everyone and anyone to play and once you buy it, you'll never regret it.
  • SpellersSpellers50,382
    03 Jan 2013
    8 1 0
    I've had a bit of spare time recently so I've be trawling through XBLA looking for little games to pass the time... This eventually led to me picking up one of the original XBLA titles for 360, Geometry wars: retro Evolved.

    For those that aren't aware the game is based on a mini-game used in Project Gotham Racing 3, a game that was so loved that it was decided it could be given a polish and sold.
    The premise is very simple, you flay a two dimensional 'ship' around a square are killing all of the nicely colored pieces of geometry that cross your path.

    The game is labeled as a 2D arcade shooter, and this is a fair reflection, There is no real depth on offer here but it always meant to be that way.
    In my mind, especially after playing it for a while I wish someone would describe it as a survival horror :p, the difficulty this game offers both in it's gameplay and the added challenge of the achievements quickly turn this from a fun pick up and play game that defines the A in XBLA into amongst the most frustrating games i've ever played.

    The game starts off nice and simple. a couple of enemies on screen, you have time to get to grips with the simplistic controls, left stick move, right stick shooting direction.
    After maybe 30 seconds of this nice relaxing pace the game starts... an exponentially increasing number of enemies start to appear on the screen, black holes start pulling your ship around and it's not long before it all start to become quite overwhelming.
    A couple on minutes in and the amount of enemies enveloping the screen have been such that you are left constantly on the run tryign only to clear a path into a gap you hope will still be there when you get there, there is no break and it becomes a real test of concentration, reactions, skill, planning and quite a lot of luck as well.

    for all of you that remember the original mini game, you will remember the somewhat understated graphics reminiscent of a computer from the 90's and for those that don;t know what the looks like.
    For those that need things to look a little more shiny the game has some really nice particle effects whilst retaining the basic geometric enemies, this put along side a decent bit of background music helps to keep the player entertained.

    End of the day this was designed to be a pick up and play game, and that's exactly what it is. It offers enough of a challenge to draw in the most determined and skillful and enough action to make it enjoyable for someone looking to just pass the time.

    To sum up, it does everything you expect from it, and not a great deal more, but that's plenty for it's price and the reason after 7 years it's still selling.
    4.0
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