Rez Infinite Releases on Steam, Surprising Everyone

Image Copyright Enhance Games, Used under Fair Use Doctrine
Image Copyright Enhance Games, Used under Fair Use Doctrine

One of the best games currently available for VR, Enhance Games’ Rez Infinite has released on Steam and the Oculus store with no pre-release warning or hype, to the delight and surprise of Rift and Vive users on PC.

The game is currently available for £15.99 (or your regional equivalent) on Steam and the slightly less £14.99 on Oculus, although the latter lacks the digital deluxe content that comes for a limited time with the Steam release.

The stylistic synaesthesia shooter originally came out on the Dreamcast and PS2 in 2001, to critical acclaim, and its reputation only magnified with a HD port in 2009 and a VR version, Rez Infinite, that released last year on PSVR and was believed to be an exclusive release for the PS4 and PSVR, becoming that system’s main killer app, in the same way Job Simulator was for HTC Vive and Superhot VR was for Oculus Rift.

From Out of Nowhere, Eden

A PC version of Rez has been rumoured for nearly a decade, since the release of Rez HD And creator Tetsuya Mizuguchi’s hints that the game could arrive on other platform. Years later however, and several months of Infinite’s release, it was believed that the game would likely remain excusive to the platform. Tetsuya Mizuguchi, creator of the game and owner of the rights after buying them back from original publishers Sega, had not even remotely hinted at the possibility of a release for the other two main VR platforms; the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive. That and the established excellent relationship between Mizuguchi and Sony makes the sudden 9th August release even more shocking.

Rez is a game that’s quite difficult to adequately explain, a rail shooter with VR aesthetics but inspired by evolution, with a system built around layers and gradual development. Each of the five areas (plus Area X) has a gradually building soundscape, developing through different iterations. Every action, both player and enemy plays out on the beat, which draws you even further into the experience. Once you are in that experience, however brief the complete game it, it is completely mesmerising.

It goes without saying that for a game that has been ported 4 separate times to six separate systems that the PC iteration is excellent. A silky smooth 60 FPS throughout with obvious room for higher frame rates and resolutions beyond 1080p/60fps, the game looks mesmerising, which isn’t entirely surprising since the graphical style isn’t entirely processor intensive. The VR is as well implemented as on PSVR, with support for Oculus Touch and Vive controllers as well as mouse and keyboard and obviously support for pretty much any controller out there.

No word on whether they’ll bring back the Trance Vibrator though.

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