Geometry Wars 3: Dimensions
Review
Slick and colourful
by Matt Porter
reviewed on PC
Into another dimension (cntd)
It won’t be for everyone though, and for those Geometry Wars purists I mentioned all of the old modes make a return under the “Classic” guise in a separate menu on the good old basic map. This strips everything down and gets back to basics, and I imagine this is where most of the score hunting will lie. There are leaderboards in Adventure Mode, but the addition of Drones and the ability to unlock upgrades for them skews the scores, particularly on early levels. There are different types of drones, such as one that goes round to collect Geoms for you, another that lays mines, and so on. There are scores on early levels in Adventure Mode that would be unreasonable to achieve without maxing out upgrades on these, leaving you feel a bit daunted when you first jump in.
Slick and colourful
The whole design of the game just has a wonderfully streamlined and polished feel about it. If you fail a level you can hit a button to restart instantly, before you have even finished exploding. Or you can quickly check your place on the leaderboard before hitting the quick retry button. Everything is built around getting you back in the game as quickly as possible. From when you first hit the main menu to when you turn the game off, you won’t experience a single load time, which is fantastic.
Presentationally speaking, Geometry Wars 3 is just as slick as you would expect. Colours and particles flash across the screen, and although it is cluttered, once you have been playing long enough you know exactly what you are looking at. The blue shapes will follow me. The green ones will try to avoid my shots. The orange ones will go in straight lines. It’s matched by the sound design. Not only is the music high tempo and hugely catchy, audio cues will tell you what’s going on. I don’t need to check my score because the announcer just told me I reached the next star level. The “super state” just spawned, which will give me a boost to my firepower or another bonus, so I need to go and find it. That beeping sound means my shield is about to run out.
Can’t stop playing
You certainly reach a point where you have entered “The Zone”, with Geometry Wars 3. The fact that it is so easy to jump back into a level means hours drift by in the blink of an eye. And I mean just one, because you can’t blink while playing. There are about 300 other games that have come out in November that I need to play, but I haven’t loaded up a single one of them since I first launched Geometry Wars 3: Dimensions. And although my right thumb hurts, I’m going to play more right now. I’m serious, there is actual pain. Send help.
9.1
fun score
Pros
A fresh take on an old formula. Wonderful design and presentation.
Cons
Upgrades spoil adventure mode leaderboards. Some levels unreasonably difficult.
