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This is a recent addition to PS+ that has taken me by surprise. Not only did it hit PS+ on its release date, but its really good. Velocity 2x is basically a shmup and a 2d platformer, where you switch between your ship, and your character to enter space stations in order to open up more areas for your ship to go, which are gated by force fields. 

 

So no only is it 2 cool genres within one game, but as the title suggests, it's all about speed. The aim of most levels is to do it as fast as possible, and you have a bunch of tricks to help you. There's a teleport that can be used in both the shmup and platformer stages. It's mainly for traversal through walls, but can also be used to get through the levels way faster. 

The shmup sections also have a boost, which lets you move the screen. So the player controls the screen scrolling. 

 

There are leader boards too, so get to it! Especially if you have PS+, since this fantastic game is free for both PS4 and vita.

 

Platforming:

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Shmup:

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To be honest, I'm kinda down on it

It's not velocity 2x, it's me

Okay so I haven't played all the way though to the end, I think I'm on like lvl 20. It's still giving me new abilities, so I guess half the game is a tutorial? The last ability it gave me is a warp point, which I really didn't like, it just adds an unnecessary and unenjoyable complexity to proceedings.

This game has zero player expression. The developers have created a single path through the game which you have to strictly follow, deviate from the path slightly and you won't get maximum points, deviate slightly more and you die.

This isn't a shmup, it's a glorified paint by numbers

The games just not for me. When I'm playing it I'm desperately wishing it was something else.

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It changes quite a lot as you get through. There are multiple paths you can take that require you to teleport back. I can see what you mean by zero player expression, but I really love the pace of the whole thing. Constantly trying to think ahead, guessing what's going to be there. Using all the tools available to get through the level as fast as possible. 

 

I dunno, it's very different from games I usually like, but I'm really enjoying it. Although I have to play it in short bursts because each level is rather similar to the previous. While they do change quite a lot over the course of the game, it's incremental. Plus it's rather stressful!

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I don't know if that's a really valid criticism, Mington. It's a score attack shmup; an arcade game. Gradius doesn't allow for player expression. You just get good at knowing the best path and keep doing it over and over until you have the highest score. Obviously it's fine if you just plainly don't like it or don't think it does the score attack thing very well anyway.

 

I wasn't looking forward to this at all but my brother said it was good so I idly downloaded it from PS+ on Friday and ended up finishing it by Sunday. I really enjoyed it, despite the whatever story and the last few levels doing a thing that I really hate (mechanically, I mean) but I won't talk about it until more people get there. The leaderboards are also a bit of a pain to access/see (why don't games realise they should always be visible on the level select screen?!) so I don't think I'll be playing it as a constant thing but I might dip back into it at some point to shoot stuff.

 

I played a little bit of Velocity Ultra before starting 2X and I think I'll go back and finish that now. The platforming stuff was interesting and having to switch between styles/controls kept it interesting but the ship bits really were the best part.

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A few people on my twitter feed have been singing the praises of Velocity 2X these past couple of days, and judging by some videos it looks like something I'd really enjoy...if only I had a playstation ;_;

 

One thing which didn't look good was in some of the vertically scrolling levels where the player had to put a kind of teleport marker down, complete one path of the level, then warp back and do a different path. It looked like it slowed things down a little too much, but perhaps the person playing just wasn't so great at using that function yet.

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The platforming stuff was interesting and having to switch between styles/controls kept it interesting but the ship bits really were the best part.

 

I do find I make a lot of control mistakes when I switch between the 2d and shmup parts. You get into such a rhythm (actually Polygon commented on how it feels like a rhythm game in which you control the tempo) with the controls that it's hard to switch between them even if they are similar.

 

One thing which didn't look good was in some of the vertically scrolling levels where the player had to put a kind of teleport marker down, complete one path of the level, then warp back and do a different path. It looked like it slowed things down a little too much, but perhaps the person playing just wasn't so great at using that function yet.

 

Those parts are ok, unless you make a mistake - and it's quite easy to make a mistake. They're essentially ways to make the level longer. One requires you to put down 3 or 4 markers as there are branching paths from the branching paths. Fortunately a map lets you see which switches you've hit, and where you can teleport to. 

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Those parts are ok, unless you make a mistake - and it's quite easy to make a mistake. They're essentially ways to make the level longer. One requires you to put down 3 or 4 markers as there are branching paths from the branching paths. Fortunately a map lets you see which switches you've hit, and where you can teleport to. 

 

I had fun with the game for a while, but the more complicated teleportation-heavy levels just felt like a chore. The map helps, but even then it's just kind of a pain that I have to depend on a map to tell me where to go in what was billed to me as a fast-paced shoot-em-up. It slows down the game a lot and just makes the whole thing not very fun for me.

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