You Should Probably Be Playing Velocity 2x

• Developed by Futurlab
• Published by Sierra
• Ps4, PS Vita, Steam
• Version Played: Steam
• $19.99
•  Controller support
  

THE FINAL COUNTDOWN

I don’t think it’s mere coincidence that when I ended my most recent play session of FuturLab’s “Velocity 2x” my time played was sitting at 119 minutes. This was it. The final threshold. Once crossed it could never be traversed back again.

As beneficial as Steam refunds are to the consumer (and with Valve’s complete lack of quality control they are certainly beneficial) they can also be a bit of a hindrance in that your average player is obligated to form an opinion about a title within those two hours. This is potentially unfair to some developers whose games might enjoy a bit of a slow burn before they really take off.

Think back and wonder if you had two hours to make a decision on Final Fantasy VII. Yeesh.

I didn’t purposefully set it up so that my timer would read 119 minutes but it provides a nice foundation from which to launch into an explanation of why this game deserves those first two hours and THEN some.

All The Small Things

I’m going to be completely honest. I have no clue what’s going on in this game beyond what it says on the store page. The game’s story is told through pop up dialogue between two talking heads in between missions and for the first few missions I paid attention somewhat to it. However due to the lack of voice acting and my own personal lack of interest in why I was doing what I was doing (which for the record I didn’t need to know to enjoy doing it) I soon stopped.

There is an abundant supply of evidence that suggests the game’s narrative is well fleshed out though.

Goodies can be picked up during missions (though they aren’t in every mission in my experience) that will unlock view able pieces of information about characters, the locations you’ll adventure through, enemies, weapons, the various races that inhabit this universe and so on.

You can also unlock pages of the protagonist’s diary which provides some personal insight into her character and creates a connection between her and the player that’s bridged by a shared confusion concerning what’s going on. Finally, in between mission “scenes” can be watched again if you need a refresher on the game’s over arching narrative.

While personally I didn’t care at all for the story i applaud FuturLab’s attention to these details because quite frankly this game could’ve been without a narrative altogether and I’d still have no issue recommending it and that recommendation stems from its gameplay.

TWO WORLDS, ONE FAMILY

Velocity 2x is kind of like two games rolled up into one.
One game is a top down action space shoot em up akin in style to a game like Ikaruga (though not nearly as insane) while the other game is a platformer that has shoot em up mechanics but focuses moreso on traversal and navigating the level then it does on destroying everything.

In both instances your goal is to get from point A to B as fast and efficient as possible.

Each mission starts you off in the Quarp Jet and will end in the Quarp Jet, with platforming sections taking place through out whose purpose is to unlock doors on the outside that you can then fly through. This is how Velocity 2x blends the two styles of gameplay and to fantastic results.

The constant variation in how you play each and every mission adds a level of diversity that keeps the game from getting boring, anchored by a control scheme that remains the same between to the two styles of play apart from a minor difference in how your weapon is fired and how checkpoints are left.

So what will you be doing?

One moment you’ll be cruising through a level in your ship blasting through obstacles and teleporting through walls and the next moment you’re platforming through the inside of a sub station running as fast as you can to make it through and trigger all of the door switches in numerical order so that you can get back outside in your ship and continue.

The shooting and teleportation mechanics remain consistent across the two styles of play and are frequently combined with one another to create tough and rewarding challenges for the player.  You have infinite lives if you fail and the game’s default checkpoint system is incredibly forgiving and puts you right back in the action with very minor delay. However you ARE timed and the level will fail if you don’t finish it in the time allotted.

As someone who isn’t a speed runner and has some difficulty at this stage getting down the proper muscle memory to really excel at this game, the closest I’ve come to failing an entire mission was with 3 minutes left on the clock and i’ve seen mission times fall anywhere between 10 and 20 minutes.
Therefore I can say that at this point in my time with it I haven’t encountered anything that your average gamer shouldn’t be able to handle with a few good attempts. Though competitively speaking i’m personally a lost cause. Ha.

But make no mistake, this is a speed runner’s dream and this game is tailored to them.

STATS STATS STATS STATS ST-STATS STATS STATS STATS ST-STATS EVERYBODY!

At the end of each mission your’re award points based on your performance in various areas of the game and these individual point totals make up the look of that mission’s completion medal.

Want to have the shiniest badge possible? Do better scrub.

Your total score across all the missions you’ve completed is put into an online leaderboard so you can compete with your friends or cry yourself to sleep at night if you try to rank up overall.

This game even comes with a calculator if you’re really hardcore.

The game’s main campaign consists of 50 missions but it also comes packaged with two more content packs that add another 16 missions tailored to challenge the player’s skills with specific mechanics bringing the grand total to 66 levels in all that can be replayed over and over again to maximize your score.

And on top of that there’s a daily mission or “Daily Sprint” that’s randomly generated once a day. You complete that mission once and that’s your score for everyone to see until it resets the next day so don’t suck.

The more I play this game the more I’m falling in love with it. It’s an addicting and expert mix of shoot em up and platforming mechanics that form a cohesive and full experience that’s chock full of content.

And did I mention the soundtrack is kick ass?

Graphically the game is gorgeous. Early on in development they made a switch from pixel art to the extremely vibrant vector art you see here and it works to the game’s benefit as it maintains a very futuristic motif that fits with the game’s themes. The way glass shatters and your weapons cause huge explosions is all extremely visually satisfying made so in no small part thanks to some stellar sound design.

The sheer amount of game here means that you’ll certainly get bang for your buck if this is the kind of fast paced gameplay you’re in to. I can’t recommend Velocity 2x enough and I’m honestly surprised at how quietly this one seems to have snuck in, no doubt being missed by some gamers after the recently released King’s Quest by the same publisher.

Futurlab has a winner here regardless and as a fan of action platformers and shmups you’d be doing yourself  a disservice by not playing it.

You can do a hell of a lot worse for twenty bucks, that’s for sure. Especially on Steam nowadays.