Niche Plays: PlayStation Plus August 2016

August's PS Plus offerings have dropped and at first glance I'd say they're kinda disapointing, but don't write them off yet. I'm not too excited as I already own half of what is on offer, but that also gives me the ability to point out there are some under-rated gems!

Retro/Grade

This quirky game has shown up on Plus before, but if you didn't catch it then check it out this time around. It looks just like a normal sidescrolling space shooter but you actually join the action at the end of the game... you're explosive victory suddenly causes things to go a bit wibbly-wobbly and time starts to run in reverse, meaning you have to un-dodge projectiles and suck your bullets from the enemy. This would be pretty difficult playing as a standard space shooter, so you in fact play more like a rhythm game, so much so that you can even connect one of your guitar controllers to pilot your ship. There's an appropriately thumping soundtrack, plenty of neon and a few gameplay twists and tweaks to keep you on your toes. Even if you only play the first level it's worth downloading for the experience.

Patapon 3

The vita gets yet another PSP game this month, but I wouldn't complain too much. It's easy to forget how many great games the PSP had and a lot of them hold up surprisingly well. Patapon is one of them, it's another twist on the rhythm genre with a quirky art style.

You tap out different rhythms using the face buttons, each assigned to a sacred drum (pata, pon, don, chaka). Each rhythm is used to command your troops, a bunch of enthusiastic eyeballs in various classes (swordsman, archer etc). I had so much fun with these games on PSP, and this 3rd instalment may be the biggest and most developed as each instalment added in new features, I still like the purity of the first game but Patapon 3 has all the bells and whistles including online multiplayer which actually still works on the Vita. If the gameplay strikes a chord with you be prepared for weeks of chanting the tunes as they get stuck in your head and bobbing your vita along in time to the beat every time you play. The only thing to be disappointed about here is that the Vita never got it's own Patapon game.

Rebel Galaxy

Typical that this game pops up as part of Plus just weeks after I bought it. I have to say it's not quite what I expected, I'm still searching for a current gen replacement for Colony Wars but this plays a lot more like a bunch of PC games I was playing just over ten years ago.Roam the galaxy, run trade routes and complete combat missions while keeping an eye out for pirates, managing your relationship to different factions, upgrading your ship and uncovering the mystery through story missions and dialogue. All just what i'm looking for but the combat is less dogfighting and more naval combat, all about relatively slow positioning of your ship to bring the right weapons to bear at the right time, just like those PC games I was talking about. It's a pretty neat game and relatively well made, perhaps the nostalgia hit is enough for me to enjoy it.

It's nice to see this kind of game make it's way to console, but hitting Plus only a week before No Man's Sky I doubt many people will be giving it the time it deserves.

Honourable mentions to the rest of the plus lineup... 

Tricky Towers looks like a Tetris clone, only imagine Tetris with physics enabled so you have to balance each block which makes it close to a 2D version of PSMove classic, Tumble, it should be fun multiplayer but does feature a single player mode too.

 

Yakuza 5 is another worthwhile entry and a full game rather than a small indy offering, I've always had respect for the franchise with all it's side quests and distractions, now's my chance to sink some time into one.

Ultratron, isn't one I know much about but by all accounts is a competent fresh take on arcade shooters, it's also worth noting I haven't been disappointed with anything from one of the developers, Curve Digital.

You might have to dig a little deeper to find something you love this month but there's still some quality gaming to be had. Have you tried any of these games before? Feel free to pass on you impressions for the uninitiated; comments below.