It's finally here! It's twice the price of the original, at 800 points, but there is a lot more here with six modes and local multiplayer. (No online, I guess any latency would make the game unplayable for one of the players.)
The biggest change here is the introduction of the Geoms from the Wii and DS versions, which you collect to increase your multiplyer. There are also some new enemies, and "gates" that you can bounce shots off to hit enemies for bonus points (and an achievement.)
The modes are:
Deadline - The only mode unlocked from the start, this is much like the original, except there is a three minute time limit, and you have infinite lives.
King - You only have one life, and there are zones on the playfield that you can shoot from, and that enemies can't enter. The zones decay a few seconds after you enter them so you have to move to another, and while outside the zone you cannot fire. There's a fun achievement to get here too, where you must enter 30 zones without firing a shot.
Evolved - Just like the first game, except harder to earn bonus lives (for me at least), and there are some new enemies.
Pacifism - Currently my favourite mode, despite the lack of shooting. You must avoid enemies for a long as possible. Gates appear, and flying through a gate destroys nearby enemies. Chaining gates gives more points, and (seems to) destroy a larger number of enemies. This gets hectic very fast!
Waves - I only played this one enough to unlock the next mode. Enemies come in waves that stretch across the playfield, and only fly in straight lines.
Sequence - This mode has 20 levels, which you have 30 seconds to complete. There is no randomness so you need to learn the patterns to reach the next level in time.
Graphically the game is pretty much identical to the previous game (lighting and particle effects seem a little bit nicer) and the music is very similar too. The mode select screen is very nicely designed, showing the top six friends for each mode so you can see at a glance if someone has beaten any your scores. It also shows this scoreboard at Game Over, along with a summary of your last few tries. You can also choose if you want the "High Score" that shows while you play to be your personal best, or the best of all your friends.
There are a couple of easy achievements (Magpie, Phobia) and some real bastards (Wax Off
) and the choice of modes means that if you get frustrated with one thing you can switch to something very different.
The biggest change here is the introduction of the Geoms from the Wii and DS versions, which you collect to increase your multiplyer. There are also some new enemies, and "gates" that you can bounce shots off to hit enemies for bonus points (and an achievement.)
The modes are:
Deadline - The only mode unlocked from the start, this is much like the original, except there is a three minute time limit, and you have infinite lives.
King - You only have one life, and there are zones on the playfield that you can shoot from, and that enemies can't enter. The zones decay a few seconds after you enter them so you have to move to another, and while outside the zone you cannot fire. There's a fun achievement to get here too, where you must enter 30 zones without firing a shot.
Evolved - Just like the first game, except harder to earn bonus lives (for me at least), and there are some new enemies.
Pacifism - Currently my favourite mode, despite the lack of shooting. You must avoid enemies for a long as possible. Gates appear, and flying through a gate destroys nearby enemies. Chaining gates gives more points, and (seems to) destroy a larger number of enemies. This gets hectic very fast!
Waves - I only played this one enough to unlock the next mode. Enemies come in waves that stretch across the playfield, and only fly in straight lines.
Sequence - This mode has 20 levels, which you have 30 seconds to complete. There is no randomness so you need to learn the patterns to reach the next level in time.
Graphically the game is pretty much identical to the previous game (lighting and particle effects seem a little bit nicer) and the music is very similar too. The mode select screen is very nicely designed, showing the top six friends for each mode so you can see at a glance if someone has beaten any your scores. It also shows this scoreboard at Game Over, along with a summary of your last few tries. You can also choose if you want the "High Score" that shows while you play to be your personal best, or the best of all your friends.
There are a couple of easy achievements (Magpie, Phobia) and some real bastards (Wax Off
) and the choice of modes means that if you get frustrated with one thing you can switch to something very different.
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