Having grown up loving games like StarStrike II on the ZX Spectrum and Star Voyager on the NES, I’ve sorely missed the genre. Therefore I was pretty excited to see if Anshar 2: Hyperdrive could rekindle my love affair with the space combat genre.

Vomit Comet

Everything in Anshar 2: Hyperdrive will, on the surface, be familiar to anyone who has played Anshar Wars 2. The story appears unchanged, and the visuals, while undoubtedly a little shinier in terms of texture resolution and lighting effects, are similar. You may be wondering what there is to get excited about in this ‘Hyperdrive’ edition of a 4-year-old game. The answer is simple: Anshar Wars 2 was a three-degrees-of-freedom experience, whereas Hyperdrive uses all six.

The difference this makes is revolutionary. Bringing current-gen 6DoF to Hyperdrive makes this the first time Anshar, an IP born and raised in the medium, has actually been a ‘proper’ VR experience.

The game begins with a potted history of the Anshar/Nergal war in which you, an unnamed pilot, are a new recruit. A brief tutorial level then introduces you to the fundamentals before it’s straight into the action.

The control options in Hyperdrive are vast. Each axis can be mapped to either stick or full accelerometer controls with either controller. Various degrees of snap-turning are available. Aiming for both your primary and secondary weapons can be similarly configured or linked to your head movement. Triggers for these weapons can also be assigned independently.

The individual elements may not sound much in isolation, but together they offer the ability to combine buttons, sticks, head tracking, and accelerometer controls in ways that will enable any player to find a set-up that suits them perfectly – and that’s before we’ve even gone into the choice of third or first-person view.

Which of these two perspectives you chose will be down to personal preference. The third-person view appears to be the more popular option, but I found the craft’s position on screen both distracting and awkward to manoeuvre when navigating insta-death asteroid fields. The first-person option offers a lot more immersion at the possible price of what is politely called ‘comfort’ and less politely called ‘vomiting on your shoes.’

Despite the science of ‘VR Discomfort’ being relatively well understood, my experience was somewhat less predictable. I once deposited my lunch into a bin while 10 pin bowling in Rec Room. Yet, somehow, skimming the hull of an enemy mothership, gunning down highly manoeuvrable fighters, spinning around to defend myself from artillery, and then pulling a loop back to finish off a turret whilst playing Hyperdrive inflicted upon me no ill effects whatsoever. You may not be so lucky, and that would be a shame because as good as the third-person mode is, playing this game in first-person using motion-controls as the flight stick is some of the best fun I’ve had in VR yet. 

Starry-eyed surprise

Fun, I think, is the perfect yardstick by which to measure Hyperdrive.

Star Wars Squadrons is clearly the big show in VR when it comes to Space Combat Simulators, and there’s little doubt that the EA & Lucasarts’ product has bigger, more realistic visuals and benefits from a vast fanbase and an equally vast budget. But OZWE, a Swiss developer consisting of 12 people and a dog called Basil, have produced a game that is simply more fun to play.

The visuals may render everything in a slightly chunky toy box style that threatens to expose the series origins in mobile VR, but the levels bring creativity and a consistent style that can’t be ignored. Even with the ostensibly low polygon count on offer, these developers often pull together scenes and vistas that are much more than the sum of their parts, and the multiple spacecraft you have to control throughout the game are unique and very well designed. Especially in first-person, the interstellar dogfights and large scale battles are vividly brought into (virtual) reality in a way that I could only imagine as a child.

Audio too is delivered with no small amount of class. 

Music is as bombastic as it needs to be given the dramatic context, and the spatial audio used for the sound effects is a real treat. It serves as a great assist in the heat of battle and plays no small part in the immersion of the first-person mode.

Urgent, in-game radio chatter is supplemented by further exposition between levels. While the comic book style is simple, and quite a few phrases are repeated, it serves its purpose well. The voice acting is exactly the kind of slightly melodramatic nonsense I want in a game about gunning down alien baddies from inside my brightly coloured space jet. 

Why so Sirius?

All this fun makes it difficult to be objective about the game’s flaws because it feels a bit like kicking an excitable puppy. Still, you will encounter a few issues that impact the experience.

The biggest of these is the game’s inconsistent checkpoint system. Sometimes there are plentiful waypoints in a mission, and other times there are none at all. As early as the third mission, you’re tasked with taking down an enormous enemy command ship. This task is quite clearly delineated into 4 sections – and yet offers not a single checkpoint.

When you’ve figured out how to beat them, most of the game’s missions are fairly short and can be beaten in around 5 minutes. But it’s very rare to achieve this on the first try. Usually, it’ll take quite a few attempts to work out the correct approach to a level. 

Another issue is that there are occasions when progression objectives aren’t entirely clear. You quickly learn to pay close attention to the instructions imparted over the radio. The instructions aren’t usually repeated, and there isn’t a log to refer to if you miss something.

Bang for your Star-buck

The single-player story mode is divided into thirteen levels. There’s no escaping that this alone doesn’t offer space opera longevity, but each mission has an optional time goal and sub-objective that, together, provide a good amount of replayability. A lot of the missions you’ll want to enjoy again anyway, so having these extra targets to aim for while you do is very welcome. I think that a short game you’ll play many times is better than a long one you’ll play once, and Anshar 2: Hyperdrive falls very much into the former category.

There are also three multiplayer modes to explore. Somewhat predictably for a less than high profile game on the Quest, each of the Battle Royale, Death Match and Co-op modes are pretty sparsely populated. Matchmaking is either non-existent or rendered useless by the low player counts on the servers. When I have found games to join, it’s been a fun time, and the atmosphere has been notably good-humoured. 

There’s a small dedicated community attached to Anshar Wars that is very welcoming but, through no fault of their own, its members are very good at the game. This can prove intimidating for newcomers in the competitive modes. Death Match plays out as you would imagine, as does the Battle Royale mode. Still, the issue of low player numbers (at least in my experience) is a bigger problem here than elsewhere. 

Co-op is currently a single one-off mission where those highly skilled players are very welcome, but as much as the addition of some new features such as special icons to collect and explosive enemy defence tactics are great in theory, they’re never really explained and in some cases their effect isn’t apparent. New maps and other updates are planned for all multiplayer modes, but I think uptake will need to increase by a fair amount if they are ever to see the light of day.

My god, it’s full of stars!

There’s no hiding from the fact that Anshar 2: Hyperdrive is definitely not a mega-budget Space Combat game pushing the limits of VR. However, it’s ridiculous to judge things based on what they’re not instead of what they are – and what this game is, is terrific fun.

Each potential technical negative is mitigated through personality and character: The graphics are simple, but the art direction is elegant. The story is mired in tropes, but the delivery is endearing. The number of levels is small, but they offer enormous variety. The duration of the missions may be short, but the urge to replay them is strong and well rewarded.

Because of the sparsely populated multiplayer servers, I would broach caution if random multiplayer is a priority for you, but the single-player campaign alone is worth every penny of the fifteen quid asking price.

ON A SAMSUNG GALAXY FAR, FAR AWAY

End Space was initially released on Google Cardboard, Gear VR, and then Oculus Go; its mobile origins are pretty apparent from the off. Sadly, the game opens with a 360-degree video sequence which is so compressed that it’s reminiscent of an early YouTube VR video. The voice-over sounds a bit like it’s coming from one of those talking birthday cards. Not really a grand way to show off your crazily impressive new VR headset. Thankfully, the rest of the game is a tad more upmarket, even if it never really frees itself from its modest roots.

TO BOLDLY COME FROM GO

The main menu screen sees the player on a gantry in a spaceport. He’s a slightly pudgy, space-suited feller standing to the left. He’s presumably a commanding officer, replete with a typically gruff voice. There’s a modest map of available missions, and options to upgrade your ship and so on displayed beneath. Only the tutorial is initially open, and levels open up linearly but can be replayed for extra credits.

The presentation is distinctly average, and in the case of the upgrade screens, downright disappointing. The upgrades aren’t illustrated, just wordy text descriptions. You also have to shift your view round to check what you can afford. You might be forgiven for thinking the game had started life as a flat mobile game rather than having been built for VR. 

DON’T GET COCKY

The missions are straightforward affairs which involve what you might expect– a mix of go-there, scan-or-explode-that, then a dogfight with some space fools, and variations of such. There are lasers to fire and missiles to launch, all of which operate on strict cooldowns. Just holding down the fire buttons until things burst is not going to cut it.

There’s a pace to the dogfighting and to each mission which might be familiar (and a little easy) to space combat veterans who’ve cut their teeth on other titles. If this is your first space combat game, particularly in VR, then it will provide a nice frisson as you delight in tracking your guns and/or missiles with your head, see your virtual hands moving on the controls, and generally experience the X-wing vibe.

The cockpit graphics are well-wrought and crisp, and the ship has an unexpectedly cool, Mad Max-ish, distressed-metal appearance which looks great. 

Be aware that End Space may not be a pleasant experience for those new to VR. The combination of authentic 360-degree movement, independent head tracking for weapons, and a slightly inconsistent framerate may lead to some motion sickness or headaches. I have pretty stout VR legs and haven’t suffered at all with VR sickness since playing Scavenger’s Odyssey on PSVR two years ago. Despite that, I still felt a little nauseous after my prolonged sessions with End Space.

DISENGAGE

What you probably won’t find anywhere in the experience is much of a thrill. It should be unthinkable that dogfighting in space could be bland, but that’s the overriding feeling I have from End Space. There’s just not a lot of excitement here. Nothing feels particularly satisfying to accomplish. For instance, the explosions and collisions are weedy, and lack weight and import. This makes combat just a matter of carefully watching icons and timing button presses rather than it being a visceral, pulse-pounding affair.

The story is little more than a placeholder. To this reviewer, it’s a bit distasteful being cast as a hired gun for an empire, shooting rebels as they try to overthrow what seems like a brutal regime. It certainly doesn’t feel as cool as being Boba Fett, either. It would have felt so much more edifying if the game had centred around the plucky efforts of rag-tag rebels to overthrow their big bad overlords. Or perhaps that’s starting to sound too familiar. 

IN SPACE, NO ONE CAN HEAR WHAT YOU’RE SAYING

The audio is at best bland. At its worst, it’s compressed and crackly. There are two voices in the game, Gruff McSpaceman as mentioned previously, and the female ship’s computer voice. Both get drowned out by the action and general disinterest; it’s all too easy to zone out from the utterly mediocre story beats. The music is just there. It should be exciting and an essential accompaniment to the action, but it just isn’t a noticeable presence in the game. 

It’s easy to miss the feedback telling you about incoming missiles while in the heat of battle. The warning text is both squashed and hard to read. It’s also positioned on the window display facing forwards, rather than on the HUD following the player’s head, which is usually looking elsewhere to track enemy ships. The warning bleeps happen too late to really make any kind of difference other than to annoy you just before you blow up. 

It should be noted that the game has exhaustive options to customise the controls, and this is laudable. I found the default setup a bit poor, and despite a lot of fiddling, there just wasn’t one particular setup that really clicked for me. I’m sure that grizzled space pilots might get a kick from tinkering with the control methods but will be disappointed by the underlying simplicity of the game itself. Similarly, those wanting a quick shootyzap in space aren’t going to want to mess about for ages getting a more satisfying experience.

Length

The game features a dozen missions, and decent pilots will burn through it in a couple of hours. Some replayability is offered by the fact that you can replay missions for more credits to upgrade the ship and score better mission times. However, without any kind of leaderboard or multiplayer, it’s not something you’ll want to come back to again and again. There’s certainly no reason to revisit the story, which isn’t any kind of hook at all. 

SUMMARY 

End Space is the first of its kind on the Quest, and it’s at a sensible price. This will earn it some sales and generate some smiles, but I suspect it won’t really be remembered. Nearly everything about it is just OK, and no one particular thing stands out as impressive. For £10.99/$14.99 you could do a lot worse, and of course, if you’re desperate for some space combat on the Quest, then it will be perfectly serviceable. 

UNINTENDO CONSEQUENCES

Let’s get some of the negatives out of the way first. There’s nowhere near the level of charm or polish present here that you might expect from a Nintendo offering. The graphics are bright and breezy for sure, but also almost painfully simple. The jaunty Latin soundtrack tries to inject a light-hearted note to proceedings but is incessant. I’d put money on people turning it off long before their time with the game is done. However, these things speak to a lack of budget, not a lack of care, and it’s apparent that the developers put a lot of heart and thought into this title.

FREE AS A BIRD

The game is deceptively simple, presenting a series of essential tasks to be completed in an ultralight aircraft (and later, other planes) that gradually increase in complexity as the game carries on. Taking off, flying, landing, navigating through a certain number of hoops… Most people would know what to expect from the game from the minute they read the title. It’s rewarding and playable in short, bite-sized play sessions, something that is absorbing if you want to be, but also good to dip into for five minutes.

Ultrawings has a pleasingly convincing flight model, with the realism defined by the player through a simple options menu, and it’s perfect for showing VR to the uninitiated. By default, there’s a nausea-reducing option active, which means that the cage of the ultralight conceals the full panoramic view via shutters. The shutters open when you look round and then close again when you look away. It’s a little odd, but adequate for some. As for me, I don’t have a problem with VR, and I like my experiences full fat, so that particular comfort option was switched off right away. With the blinkers off, the immersion really takes hold despite the simplicity of the graphics.

HIT ME WITH YOUR FLYING STICK

It’s a charming touch to have the controls of the planes as physical objects to interact with inside the game world and feels surprisingly comfortable. It’s one of those things which helps sell the experience to people who don’t usually play games. Teaching people to use an analogue joypad is one thing, but grabbing a virtual joystick and buttons/levers feels far more natural. (Unless you’re Biffo of course).

I must make a special mention of the sound design, which is terrific. The mechanical puttering of the plane, the sound of the wind whistling past… It all adds considerably to the immersion, and once you turn that music down, it’ll be convincing you that you’re up there in the sky in no time. Angle a decent fan towards you as you play (you should get one for Beat Saber if you haven’t already)! Then smear a bit of engine oil and sea salt under your nose, and the effect will be complete.

LAST WORDS

There are several airports and planes to unlock, and some hearty challenges await. It never quite reaches the giddy heights of being Pilotwings VR, of course, but then in not aiming for the stars, it never does an Icarus either. Overall, Ultrawings presents excellent value for money and beguiling gameplay and is a lovely way to while away time in VR. Its bite-size structure and accessibility mean it’s really well-suited to party play or longer sessions for solo pilots.

A splendid, light flying experience tailor-made for VR, at a great price point.