Geometry Wars Galaxies (DS)
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Ok, this is me. Eating a hat. It’s not my hat, it’s my kids - but as I don’t own a hat, it’s the closest we’re going to get to me eating my hat. If it really bothers you that it’s someone elses hat - then just pretend. It’ll make life easier in the long run.
You see, I think I owe Kuju a slight apology for saying that there’s no way on Earth that Geometry Wars would translate well to the DS. They’ve not only managed to pull off a fine portable version of the game, but managed to make a game that shames both the original and RE versions as shallow, empty and hideously unbalanced games. Ok, so they’re not the first to do that - Mark Incitti managed that with his excellent Grid Wars but we all know what happened to that, this is - at least - the first commercial and official version of the game to get everything pretty much right.
Instead of now taking place over just the one arena, Galaxies presents you with 60ish worlds over 10 galaxies, so unlike the original PC release of Retro Evolved which weighed in at a hefty £10+ (now at a far more reasonable £2.50~ish on Steam or £2 from MSN Games, fact fans) you’re actually getting some serious value for money from this release from the offset. Naturally, it doesn’t matter how many levels you throw into the game if it’s a piece of uncontrollable, unplayable bland shit - luckily for us, dear readers - it’s rather fucking excellent.
From the very first level, you begin to realise that they’ve nailed the gameplay down really well and adapted the concept of both Geometry Wars and the arena shooter as a whole perfectly for the handheld. As much as I had doubts originally, I’d heartily recommend playing with stylus control for shooting unless you want your hand to end up resembling the spaceship that you control after 5 minutes. You’ll be shooting frantically as the levels progress and having to use the dpad and buttons will leave you an arthritic cripple in no time. We don’t want that now, do we?
Each level has its own unique twist on the formula, and this is where GW:G really excels itself. Not only does it plunder the Geometry Wars universe for inspiration, but in the same way that Space Giraffe brought together 30 years of tube shooting arcade brilliance into one package - GW:G does the same for arena shooters. About the only thing the game is short of is a level in the shape of a kitchen sink.
Along the way you’ll find yourself fighting amongst your standard rectangular arenas against the standard Robotron-esque grunts of Geometry Wars, battling black holes - at first your bog standard suck-everything-in style, then later, ones that double as spawn points pissing enemies onto the screen at a rate of knots, massive enemy spawners appearing at every corner that break down Asteroids-style until your left with a pair of containers ready to unleash hordes of nasties at you, craft drifting into the screen from outside the boundaries, fighting around tight corners and small rooms Gauntlet style and for the icing on the cake, dealing with supermassive black holes (thanks Muse, you’ve got that stuck in my vocabulary now) acting like whirlpools in the centre of the screen spinning both you and the enemies around. In short - there’s an absolute wealth of concepts spread over these levels. One thing the game rarely gets is boring.
You’re aided and assisted by drones which you can purchase using “geoms” (small splinters that float around the screen after an enemy is destroyed - also doubling as things you use to up your multiplier) - the more you play the game, which if you’re a high score fiend will be a fair bit, the more you increase the power of your drones. You can choose from a selection of defense drones, attack drones, drones that spin around you taking out any enemies in close proximity… sometimes picking the right drone for the right level can make an absolute world of difference to your scores and help you come away with that gold medal for the level you know you really want.
The great thing is, you always feel like you’re making progress. Even if you flunk a level badly within 10 seconds, you’ll likely come out with either a more fortified drone or at the bare minimum more of those geom thingies to help you unlock the next world or galaxy. Everything in the game is about risk and reward, and you’re constantly rewarded just for playing. Play well, and you reap (on most levels anyway) extra lives, bombs, geoms galore and an increase in your chosen drones power as well as a gold medal and the satisfaction of reaching a rather nice high score. It makes it worth your while, and that’s to be commended. Not at any point does the game berate you or punish you, you have to work really hard to come out of a stage empty handed no matter how badly you play.
Mind you, it’s not all sweetness and light in the GW:G universe. Sometimes the balance flies way out of whack. Orbeis is a tedious grind, I ended up killing myself on Vareis with 9 lives, 9 bombs and 300+ million on the clock as by the time you hit gold medal status the stage stops getting any more difficult and becomes a breeze. Even losing a life had little consequence as one brief charge through the spawning enemies netted you a 150x multiplier and in no time at all, another extra life. These levels though, are thankfully few and far between. For the most part, you’ll be far too swept up in the chaos and carnage of a screen exploding around you to notice.
Geometry Wars Galaxies is the arena shooter done right. Not since Wild West Hero or Robotron before it has a developer managed to nail the essence of the arena shooter down quite so well and I’m happy to eat my hat, your hat and the hat of anyone in the world if it means that I’m so stupidly wrong about something that eventually turns out so right.
Ok, so there may be no warping grid, the included version of Retro Evolved is pointless and on the rarest of occasions, the level design is a bit skewiff in the balancing stakes, but none of that is worth getting in a hissy fit over because the entire package is put together so beautifully and really, the game should be an essential purchase for blaster fanatics.
It’s fucking ace, it is and proof, if ever it were needed, that gameplay rules over a million and one fancy particle effects anyday.
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Mersey Remakes is the home of Retro Remakes administrator Oddbob.
Here you can find his rants, freeware retro remakes, development blog and game reviews.
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Recent Comments
tim on 
next up - dirty socks.
As long as it’s not soiled underwear, I don’t mind
Thank you for doing a new review.. just for me.
And thank you for the hat bit too…
(btw… great write-up and an amazing little web design upgrade)
Another new forum skin! Nice.. But I still think the main page now looks a bit busy. Any way of streamlining it a bit?
Well, it’s technically the same one - just with a lick of paint.
I’ve ditched the seperation from the main site now, so it all just points to the blog. Once I’ve fixed the colours up properly on this, I’ll tidy the front page up a bit, aye. Needs some stuff moving up and down and some stuff taking out.
I’m on the case
Just make sure the latest post is indeed the latest…
Very Nice Review. I shall have to find and destroy!!!