The Basic Things To Know

The art style is gorgeous and unique.

The game starts easy, but the difficulty quickly picks up.

The story stays out of the way of the gameplay.

There are a shit ton of levels to be played.

Kai comes off as a bit of a Samus ripoff, but with more personality.

The game has two different major gameplay styles (side-scrolling and top-down arcade style space navigation.)

The DLC is as good as the game.

All later acquired abilities and powers are useful and fun to use.

This game plays FAST!

It has astonishing replayability.

The Game

Velocity 2X is new, familiar and fun as hell. A side scrolling shoot ‘em up and a top down arcade space shooter. In the year 2212, Vilio, a star, collapses and leaves all nearby intelligent life without power.
Elsewhere, Lt. Kai Tana, a badass, sarcastic and easy going Samus Aran rip-off, wakes up from a coma in an alien space station.

Having been rebuilt with the ability to teleport

and enhancements which turn her hands into deadly energy weapons

she proceeds to attempt an escape.
Hjun Ralan III, a local slave alien and the one responsible for rebuilding her, helps Kai reach her ship in the escape effort in exchange for her assisting his civilization of slaves to be freed from their cruel overlord.

Let’s start, shall we?

Velocity is fast paced. So much, in fact, it’s nearly the point of the game. Kai races through levels on foot in side-scrolling gameplay, half of the time,

and the top down view of her ship, the Quart Jet.

The gameplay and controls are incredibly easy to pick up and understand which allows even faster movement through the level. But don’t be fooled, this game comes with its difficulties. As the game progresses and the player learns to maneuver the hostiles in each level it becomes apparent how often curve balls are thrown to stunt speed and slow the player nearly to a halt.

The game pins Kai against hordes of enemies in the middle of her path, usually in an obvious to defeat pattern to continue moving forward, but over time the obviousness is obscured and the patterns vary more widely, sometimes leading to confusion and uncertainty of which is the next best move.

The game manages to maintain its entertainment aspect and fun straight through ‘till the end. There’s also a pretty large clusterfuck of levels to play, making the fun last, but the difficulty continues to ramp up with progression, so keep those reflexes well trained.

As the player progresses, each level will have a certain number of objectives ranging from rescuing survivors, to collecting crystals for power, to beating the level played at a certain speed or a certain number of enemies destroyed before finishing. These objectives are then scored at the end of the level. Based on overall score points are awarded and unlock later levels.

This repeats until they’re all unlocked and the game is completed. These scores also promote great replayability as players go back to older levels in order to improve and ultimately maximize their score.

Through the course of the game Kai acquires new abilities and weapons for both her and her ship. And unlike many games that give a single use or specific locations for the abilities, here they’ll be used quite frequently after they’ve been unlocked. From new guns

to different forms of teleportation,

using them well means faster paced gameplay. Like the controls, they are easy to understand and fun to use throughout the game.

The story progression is amazing, too. It’s simple, short and straight to the point, returning the player to the gameplay sooner. The story is told through conversations between Kai, Ralan and the villain of the story, General Claive.

Kai is a tough, intelligent, sarcastic female protagonist that fearlessly pushes forward through the course of the game as the only hope of Ralan’s people and the end of Claive. Ralan, the brains behind the operation, is reliable and always in Kai’s ear telling her what move is best to make next. Glaive, opposite to the two protagonist, is a ruthless war criminal willing to take out anyone in his way to accomplish his goals.

The graphics and visual of the game are astonishing. The art style has the feel of American’s take on anime and the levels in the game morph beautifully throughout the course of the game to change the tone with progression, giving the sense of changing scenery. The three existing characters are incredibly unique, each of them, and feel right for the world they exist in. It’s as pleasant to look at as it is to play.

The add-on downloadable content brings several new levels in different game types. My favorite DLC for the game is Crucial Urgency, which provides six new levels in which speed and time are the most important factors for the level’s completion, and boy are they difficult. The Dual Core DLC gives the player additional levels to control two ships at once, fashioned after levels in the main game.

Verdict

This game is fun. If you like Metroidvania style games, this is not that, but it’ll steal your attention as if it was. Velocity is a great series and it’s familiar to a degree. It’s somewhat of another take on a Metroid’s Samus type of female lead. If you like fast paced games, twitchy reflex based split second decisions and a story that doesn’t get in the way of the game, but remains entertaining to learn, this game is definitely for you. Even if none of this seems like something you’re into, I recommend giving it a try because you might find yourself pleasantly surprised by how consumed you might become.

It’s easy to find yourself playing this game for hours at a time without noticing time flying by. The combination of the beautiful, vibrant graphics, the seamlessly blended in music, the smooth controls, the out-of-the-way story and the ever changing vibe of the levels and gameplay, you’ll find that this is a truly great game. And at an affordable cheap price, there is no reason to not give it a try.