The HTC Vive virtual reality headset marks its first year anniversary this week, on April 5, and is set to mark the occasion by launching the "first-ever subscription model for a VR app store"—named Viveport Subscription.
Billed as "a new way to navigate the burgeoning VR app marketplace", Viveport will cost users £6.99/regional equivalent per month, and will run a one month free trial for newbies. For that, you'll get unlimited access to your apps of choice—Viveport Subscription will launch with over 50 apps—with the ability to rotate out selections each month and try apps prior to purchase.
"VR is changing every industry imaginable, from gaming and entertainment, to art, design, engineering and education," says HTC Vive's VP of sales Peter Frolund. "The fact that we can offer a subscription model just shows the sheer amount of developers that have already engaged with Vive. This celebration and these offers are a chance for us to thank the people that have been on this journey with us from the start, as well as invite new people to the party as we look ahead to even more exciting developments going forward."
Furthering the festivities, HTC is also giving away a free copy of Vive Studios' VR action game Arcade Saga and is also offering new customers £100 off Vive headsets on April 5. More information on the Viveport Subscription service can be found on the Vive Blog.
The game Louise Blaine dubbed "the ultimate in heroic wish fulfilment" on GamesRadar, Batman: Arkham VR is breaking from its PlayStation exclusivity and is heading to PC. Due April 25, the Dark Knight will star on Oculus Rift and HTC Vive devices.
Supporting both Oculus Touch and Vive controllers, Batman: Arkham VR weaves another Arkham-set mystery for the Bat to solve—one which is said to "threaten the lives of his closest allies."
"Bringing Batman to VR was a very rewarding experience for us here at Rocksteady," says Rocksteady's creative director Sefton Hill. "The Dark Knight has always been an incredible character to work with due to his psychological depth, so it’s really exciting to use this immersive medium to delve deeper into his psyche than ever before. We’re thrilled that PC players can finally wear the cowl for themselves and take on the role of the World’s Greatest Detective with the addition of the HTC Vive and Oculus Rift versions."
And here's an excerpt from Louise's review:
"It’s completely understandable that there’s no brawling or Batmobile action, but hearing the roar of your favourite vehicle between scenes is a tantalising tease of what a full Batman VR game could be. Cleverly adding a sense of movement without any actual flight, you use the grapnel gun to fire yourself from scene to scene and from each area in the Batcave. It’s just like the Move teleporting but the added sense of bringing a gun from your belt and firing it layers in an extra sense of depth. I did this by firing my grapnel, it doesn’t matter that I’m not whizzing through the air."
"The implementation of Move controls is also quietly, understatedly brilliant. The fact that you can just look down, see the gadgets and take one from your (height adjustable!) belt is incredible. One particularly nasty crime scene requires you to rewind the action using your forensic scanner. Rotating the controller slowly speeds through the action and the result is masterfully immersive. Add in a story conclusion that I won’t spoil, but makes the most of just how terrifying VR can be, and this isn’t just a brilliant experience but a glimpse at just how the long term future of gaming could feel if the industry gets VR right."
Besides the Touch and Vive controllers, Batman: Arkham VR's PC iteration will support PS4 Dual Shock 4 controllers, Xbox One controllers and the Steam controller. It's due April 25, 2017.
A young boy named Elian dreams of more than serving drinks and heads out for a life raiding dungeons and getting sweet loot. He meets a few friends along the way, including an accountant dwarf and a sneaky minstrel, and they form a band to go on adventures and find more loot.
The gameplay consists in exploring a dungeon and fighting in it while doing missions. The exploring takes place on a top-down “board”. Each room is a single square and every turn your party moves to the next square chosen out of up to four directions.
You reveal the map as you explore but unless you use special powers, like Elian revealing two squares in each direction or Thorgrim identifying a treasure or event spot, you have no idea which way heads to treasure or leads into certain doom.
Every move is a risk, and that’s both stressful and exhilarating. It’s basically exactly what Dark Souls taps into to keep people playing, except Dungeon Rushers does it with a smile. Traps can be overcome but only if you have the finite resource that is stamina, event locations can either be a blessing or a curse, and there could be enemies waiting on the very next square but you’ll never know until you move.
The combat is very classically turn-based, the order decided by what level a character’s Speed is. Each character takes a go with a straight attack, a special attack that uses Mana, an item, or Guard. Heroes and Enemies each get two rows, and only ranged weapons or magic attacks can reach the second row until one enemy in the front row gets defeated.
There is no avoiding getting hit so winning just involves outlasting the enemy. This wouldn’t be so bad except that health potions, like all other items in the game, are finite. You can only buy one from the shop between missions and if you’re lucky you might either be able to craft one or find a healing event in the dungeon, but otherwise you can only face a certain amount of battles in a level before you die and have to play the whole thing again.
One remarkable part of the game is the easy-to-use level editor, which is rather neatly built into the main game. After a few levels a short dialogue plays where Thorgrim suggests that building their own dungeon would be a good way to earn some extra coins. I can’t say I ever got any money for my creations, but making a dungeon was strangely addictive.
Secret doors, red herrings, different types of loot, keys, password-encrypted doors, even different types of dead end are available for you to customize. Then, at a click, you can upload it to Steam Workshop or easily overwrite it if you tweak it later.
The game also has DLC available, which adds skins to the game, letting you change the appearance of your heroes. At the moment of writing this review, there are two skin packs: the Veterans and the Dark Warriors, and a third one has been announced for May 2017, the Pirates Skins Pack.
Dungeon Rushers is the type of game where you want to continually press on and find the new exciting thing in the next dungeon, not to mention some more excellent funny conversations. That’s fun. You do not want to make all the right moves then find yourself up against an unbeatable group of foes.
Name: Dungeon Rushers Developer: Goblinz Studio Publisher: Goblinz Studio, WhisperGames Released: September 6, 2016 MSRP: $14.99
Have you ever want to play a game where you were a stack of pancakes, a pug, or a cheeseburger, rolling around and knocking other players off of a platform? Well, this weekend you can because Ready at Dawn is holding a Steam open beta for its bizarre arena combat game Deformers.
Deformers puts you in control of ball-shaped creatures called Forms. They look like food, animals, and other creatures, and you control them in multiple different modes, including Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, and Form Ball, which looks a lot like Rocket League. The two deathmatch modes have you shooting objects at your opponents and rolling into them to knock them off a giant floating platform. The Rocket League-like Form Ball, on the other hand, tasks you with knocking a ball into a net and scoring goals.
The rolling action game looks quite a bit different from Ready at Dawn's previous work, which has consisted of two God of War games and The Order: 1886.
The open beta lasts from now until 12 AM PT/3 AM ET on April 3. It's a 2.5 GB download, so it shouldn't take long to download if you have a decent connection. It's worth noting that the beta is experiencing some server issues, so your ability to play may be postponed for a bit depending on when you start.
If you aren't able to jump in this weekend, then you don't have to worry. Ready at Dawn has said that it plans to have at least one more beta before launch to give more people the opportunity to jump in.
