Short Version: I like it! I only wish it had more than 3 levels, a handful of enemies and 4 weapons. It’s a very simple and cheap-looking shooting gallery, but it feels good and surprisingly comfortable to play in virtual reality. I would’ve loved it if it had more content and variety, but for 10 bucks, you can definitely do a lot worse.

Long Version: I always appreciate a virtual reality game that’s easy to play on my desk. I know that most of the appeal of VR is having a play space where you can stand up and interact with a virtual environment, but sometimes I don’t wish to do that. There is a lot to be enjoyed about games where you can sit comfortably and play something simple in VR, with a few examples being Thumper and even the Hatsune Miku: VR Future Live concert experience. I would place Pixel Gear in a similar category, since this is probably one of the most comfortable and less-cumbersome games I’ve played on PlayStation VR. It is kind of unfortunate that this game has about the same amount of content and depth as an Atari 2600 game.

Shooting Gallery

Pixel Gear is a virtual reality shooting gallery game brought to you by the same people that gave us the archery game Ace Banana during the PSVR’s launch. However, unlike Ace Banana, this game has no story. You simply start the game by choosing your difficulty, choosing a level and you’ll find yourself shooting enemies in no time. I appreciate that they let the players get to point and start playing without anything getting in the way, but everything from the opening menu to the levels and music feel incredibly cheap and empty, both literally and figuratively.

I’m usually not the kind of person to fuss about graphics, but I definitely insist on the art direction, for I think that is more important than obsessing over how realistic something looks or how high the frame rate can get. With that said, I think this game looks terrible. First off, everything has that Minecraft-style blocky look to it, and there’s nothing wrong with that, but it has that exact same feel that those slapped together Early Access games on Steam have. All of the enemies, sound effects and environments look like they were taken straight out of some sort of game creation software like Unity, where they found some free assets and templates to use, but never expanded or improved upon it.

Blander Blender

A great example of what I’m trying to get across is whenever you look down to look at your weapons, which are only four of. Even though all three levels look like they take place in some sort of medieval setting, the pistol looks like it came from Borderlands, the machine gun from The Conduit, the sniper rifle from Mass Effect and the grenade launcher from Fallout. This, along with some enemies hitting you with magic, but then some with guns, only serves to exacerbate how out of place everything feels. It is a blender of generic assets that make the whole experience feel scattershot and low quality, which is a shame, because this game is actually pretty darn fun to play.

Even though there are only three levels, a lack of variety in the enemies and barely any weapons, I found myself playing this game for a long while before I realized that 3 hours have past and did not feel motion sick in any way at all. Since you’re always standing still in one place, there are never any fast movements to make you feel sick. Even in other games like The London Heist shooting gallery and even Ace Banana, there were moments where I felt like I needed to take a short break, but never with this game, no matter how much I played, which is a pretty impressive feat to achieve amidst all of the reports of people struggling with motion sickness. Thanks to this, such things do not interrupt the addictive nature of this game.

Brief, Arcade Fun!

Despite all the bad things I’ve said about it, I’ve actually enjoyed shooting all the weapons and killing waves and waves of enemies. What is even more fun is the tiny quirks that are scattered all around the game, like shooting ghosts, being able to look through the sniper scope, shooting things in the environment that react to you and seeing a boss’ health bar be reflected as a constellation in the sky. These tiny details are what fill this game with potential, but fall short due to all of the previously addressed issues. On the other hand, this game is only $10.99, which is makes it one of the cheapest things you can buy for PlayStation VR right now.

To conclude, I think the best advise I can give you is the following: this game is not the best, but I still think it’s worth playing, especially when considering the low asking price. Everything looks cheap and ramshackle, but the actual gameplay can be pretty fun and addicting, despite how little there is to work with. Perhaps in the future we can see something with much more substance and content. They already have the advantage of not causing motion sickness, so all they need now is more variety, polish and stuff to do.