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Geometry Wars Galaxies
(by Caleb Rumley - June 11, 2008)
Geometry Wars started out on the Xbox 360 as a downloadable game featuring classic space shooter gameplay with next-gen graphics. The developers have made a new game, called Geometry Wars Galaxies which was released on the Wii and DS. The first Geometry Wars game, Retro Evolved, thrived as a $5 downloadable classic. But now, as a full-fledged game, is it worth your dollar?
Galaxies has a new single player campaign included to flesh out the Geometry Wars experience. The levels in Galaxies are all varied and interesting, and they provide a good way to get a head start in the Geometry Wars world. Every level has a certain twist on the traditional formula. Each level is set up with barriers, mines, or certain types of enemies, and each is unique in its own way.
It’s pretty simple – you play through each planet to unlock new planets, abilities, and galaxies, but it’s downright addicting. To help you take on the hordes of geometrical baddies, you have a single drone which can be set up with different trainable abilities. Each stage can benefit from the right drone tactic, and each ability can grow as you play through more of the single player mode.
Co-op modes are available, which opens up for a lot of new possibilities. It’s much easier to gun down the never-ending flow of shapes when you have a partner on hand. Galaxies also has a score-based versus mode, where two players compete on the same stage at the same time to get more points. It’s nice that the developers really worked hard to add extra components to the Retro Evolved formula, and they’re pretty enjoyable.
But unless you have a classic controller, playing the game takes a while to learn. Playing with the Wii Remote and Nunchuk can be a bit of a hassle, but it gets the job done. Using the pointer to aim your lasers is pretty effective, and is a little bit smoother than the joystick. In the end, it just comes down to personal taste – whether you like joysticks or the Wii remote, both will suffice.
Along with all of the new content comes the original game that was released on the 360, Retro Evolved. When you get tired of trying to score gold medals in Galaxies mode, you can just shoot for high scores in Retro Evolved. Sierra also included leaderboards over Nintendo Wi Fi connection. It’s a neat addition, but it’ll only prove to show you how good other players are at Geometry Wars. The top score is over 7,000,000 – and I still haven’t topped 100,000!
Geometry Wars: Galaxies has a good mix of different game modes and twists on the Geometry Wars formula. Now that it’s been out for a few months, I snagged it at a pretty good price, and you can grab it for about $30. If you’re bored and looking for something different on the Wii, Galaxies is a pretty good game that will hold your attention for a few weeks. But I can’t really see myself playing it for much longer than that. Geometry Wars: Galaxies gets an 8 out of 10.
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