This year Playstation is celebrating its 5th year anniversary of the PSVR by giving away free VR Games with it’s Free Playstation Plus Monthly games. Sony says that they have sold over 5 million units of the hardware as they are now currently working on a next gen version. There are over 500 games available for the system and according to the official Playstation blog the top 5 played in the world are: Beat Saber, Skyrim VR, Rec Room, Playstation VR Worlds, and Resident Evil 7: Biohazard. Here are a 5 PSVR Games that I personally love and one game in particular that I thought you might want to know about…and avoid!
Star Trek Bridge Crew
If you’ve ever wanted to be on the bridge of your very own Starfleet ship, engage in space missions, and boldly go where no gamer has gone before, then Star Trek Bridge Crew is every Trekkies dream come true! I highly recommend spending the extra $10 to get the next generation DLC which adds additional missions as well as the dreaded enemy hive mind nuisance, the Borg. Once you fly against the Borg you realize why resistance can be futile. Them sons of Borgs’ is hard!!!
Star Trek Bridge crew utilizes the PlayStation move controllers as your left and right hand to interact with whatever station you’re at.
The game is meant to be a four player Cooperative game, however, if an online match is not available or you have no friends who are down to clown, you can play with AI crewmembers and sit as the captain on the bridge issuing orders like Jean Luc in his underwear.
The captain is limited on what he can do so taking over an AI might be necessary for survival. This can take a little practice to get down but when playing in a VR environment it’s still a lot of fun learning and getting better.
The game has a campaign Mode where players can fly the Aegis in a series of missions to save space from danger. Playing this single player campaign mode helps the player get used to the different jobs on the bridge while slowly increasng in difficulty. By the time a player reaches the final mission they should be pretty proficiant with the different Starfleet roles.
Players can also take partin ongoing missions which are a series of rescue, science and research, and scrimmage battles against Romulan and pirate forces as either the Aegis, The Classic TOS Enterprise, or the Next Generation Enterprise, if you get the DLC. Each ship has it’s unique feel and different user interfaces that need to be familiarized
Flying in the TOS Enterprise is a challenge all on it’s own and makes you feel like you’re wearing a skirt too short for a StarFleet officer. The buttons have a very analog click sound and the readouts look like they are printed graphics being moved around a frame to give the effect of movement. Even the cuffs on your Starfleet uniform are accurate to the uniforms of the Orginal Series!
Each player in Star Trek Bridge Crew has a specific role to fill
The Navigator is in charge of Flight control & long range travel.
Engineering /operations is in charge of maintaining the ships health and relegating power to the necessary systems like engines, phasers, shields and the transporter.
The tactician is responsible for weapons firing and maintaining the shields.
Communication between all these roles is crucial for survival and the captain, who can oversee The battle and give advice and aid to their crew, needs to be confident in their decisions less you want to experience a Kobayashi Maru incident.
Just like in the Star Trek movies and TV series, fighting isn’t necessarily the right answer and the game leaves it up to the players to figure out the best way to accomplish their mission. The environmental effects really help bring the player into the universe and add to the realism of being on a Starfleet bridge. As the battle intensifies damage to the ship can be seen via small fires and sparking stations. If your ship is taking too much damage a few of your crewmembers can actually be killed in action… It’s always a sad scene to see one of your crew mates bodies being teleported off the bridge to some Starfleet morgue.
Star Wars Squadrons
If the science-fiction and fantasy of the Star Trek Universe isn’t really your bag, then perhaps the Space Opera of the Star Wars Universe is! As a young boy, I’ve always wanted to be an X-Wing pilot, I bought every Star Wars fighter game there ever was and I can hands-down tell you that Star Wars Squadrons with the VR headset feels like you’re in the cockpit if your very own Star Wars fighter!
Star Wars Squadron has a campaign mode and a multiplayer mode.
The campaign mode is a riveting story that bounces between pilots serving The Empire and the rag-tags that make up the Rebel Alliance. The missions walk players through the different ships that are available to be piloted in the game. By the time a player finishes the story missions they should have a pretty good grasp on the basic controls of the Starfighters.
Online game modes are sort of limited but still a lot of fun. The first mode is dogfighting which as simple as the title sounds is a 5×5 dogfight between the Empire and the Rebellion over some of the different systems we know from the Star Wars universe like the Imperial dockyard or above the famous Yavin. The other game mode is the objective based Fleet mode. Players take on opposing capital ships. The side that destroys the other sides capital ship first wins the match. The amount of kills that players get has no effect on the final outcome of the match, however, it can sway the momentum of the battle. Players start off the match with two support frigates and one capital ship. The players have to first take down the frigates in order to move on the capital ship. Once the capital ship is exposed, the players have to disable it’s critical systems like the shields, targeting array, and power supply. If the players are able to permanently destroy the sub-systems they will not come back online.
Players are able to unlock a plethora of customization options for both their starfighters and their characters avatar. Seasons, called Operations, give players the opportunity to earn special cosmetic items for their avatar like helmets and clothing. Players can also customize the interior of the starships with holographic projections from the movies, bobble heads and statues like Grogu, and hanging decorations like Hans “lucky dice” or a Kyber Krystal.
Rigs Mechanized Combat
Rigs Mechanized Combat is what professional sports in 300 years is probably going to look like. Large tricked out mechs, customized for agility, or specialized in defense; playing against each other in televised games in sold out arenas! The announcer in this game really gets me pumped!
Each game is 5 minute rounds of two teams of 3 players each. Each player can choose their rig, each type of rig has a specialization as well as some weaknesses.
Rigs Mechanized Game modes
Powerslam- This mode has players trying to score by jumping through a goal in the center of the ring. In order to be eligible to score a player must first go into “Overdrive” by collecting power-ups or kill streaks.
Team Takedown- The Deathmatch of the game. Players go head to head to try and score the most kills in the 5 minutes time.
Endzone- American football goes MechWarrior. Players fight each other over control of a ball. Once the player has possession of the ball they can score in their goal.
Players can unlock several different mechs to match their playing style. The better a player does, the more fans they earn, the more sponsorships offers they’ll get. These sponsorships can help unlock customizations and earn the player cash.
Warning
This is the most intense VR experience I’ve ever played on the PlayStation VR. That being said, I highly recommend taking the game on in small doses until you can build your tolerance to the amount of action in the game. I, as well as everyone I spoke to about this game, experienced the same motion sickness when first starting out. The sea-sick feeling does pass overtime. I can now play the game for a few hours without ever getting that motion sick feeling.
No Mans Sky VR Mode
I’ve written several articles about No Mans Sky. It’s a wonderful and dynamic game with lots to do and a never ending cycle of expanding galaxies for players to explore. The games third person or first person view only allow a player a fraction of what I think the game was intended to actually feel like. I was blown away by the change in the dynamics of NMS, it literally changed the game for me. Playing with the move controllers adds a third level of reality to the game by moving the inventory to your left wrist, which requires players to activate it with their right as well as holster their gun on their side or reach over their shoulder to activate their scanner.
Space combat was a whole new ball of wax and after a little bit of adjustment getting used to the move controllers individual tasks, it really became super intuitive and fun. The left hand grips the throttle while the right hand controls the flight stick and fires all the munitions. To get out of the ship the players have to grip the exit handles and lift, push, or turn the handle depending on the ship that they are flying.
Exploring is absolutely stunning in the VR Mode. You can get your face right up to the flowers and pretend to give them a whiff or get up close to your mount and get a good glimpse into its soul!
When riding animals the right hand grips the animal a bit like the reigns of a saddle and you can steer its direction by moving your hand left and right with the “reigns”
There’s nothing to make you feel smaller than walking around a planet and seeing a large space worm fly overhead and you’re able to look at it like you would in the real world. The Playstation VR was made for games like No Mans Sky!
Creed: Rise to Glory
Creed: Rise to Glory is not your ordinary sports game and it’s not for your typical couch warrior either. This game is tough and you will break a sweat in just a few rounds, that is, if you can even make it past the mandatory warm-up before every match!
Rise To Glory is stocked with a series of boxers you will recognize from the Rocky franchise including the man himself the Italian Stallion Rocky Balboa, the unforgettable Clubber Lane immortalized by Mr. T, and of course Creed himself, this game will have you jumping around your living room with your hands in the air singing “Eye of the Tiger” at the top of your lungs!
There is a storyline players can go through that has players starting off in a ratty old gym and slowly fighting their way through increasingly harder boxers until they reach the big-time: fight night in Las Vegas!
Players can get a good workout in the gym. In the gym players can test and improve their skills with the speed bag, build strength punching against the heavy bag, or work on their speed, dodging skills, and eye hand coordination.
One of the things that I love about this game is the online multiplayer capability. If you have a friend who has this game you can literally slug it out with them online or go into a lobby and find some poor unsuspecting child for you to beat up on, the greatest part about it, it’s totally legal!
The Worst PSVR Game
Rick and Morty: Virtual Rick-ality
I’m a huge fan of Rick and Morty so when I heard that they had a VR game I was ready to get rickety wrecked and spend hours playing with Mr. Meeseeks, exploring different worlds with my Morty, fucking with Jerry… my mind ran with the possibilities of what this game could be. Unfortunately, the game design and gameplay was so bad I couldn’t really move past the opening, of what I suspect, was the first 30 minutes of the game before I lost my shit, quit, and demanded a refund!
If Rick Sanchez were a real mad scientist he would have teleported this game to some farting-butt dimension while chastising the game developers who put his name on such a poorly designed dumpster fire of a game! Rick voice: “Not cool, game devs…way to phone it in! ((BURP))”
