Hypership Still Out of Control Review (XBLIG)

GDN Silver Award 8.5/10 – Essentially a refinement of the previous game with new stages, this sequel still has you racing to the end of a space-field with no brakes. That’s not a bad thing when your core idea is strong, and the $1 price is fine too. Hypership Still Out of Control is a sequel in a classic and direct sense. It takes the same mechanics and premise of its predecessor, Hypership Out of Control, and gives you more of what made the original so fun. Played as a vertical-scrolling 2D shooter, ’Hypership’ isn’t about avoiding bullet hell; it’s about not crashing into things by either getting out of their way or shooting them. This makes for a very retro style game, one that’s easy to learn and fun to play.

Nearly NES era graphics and music are joined by equally simple controls, as either analog stick or the d-pad moves your ship, while one button uses screen-clearing bombs (you only get a few), another fires your gun, and a third revives dead players in multiplayer mode. The emphasis is not on learning how to play, but rather on mastering these basic controls. Your spaceship starts out pretty slow, but it is constantly gaining speed and you’ll eventually get to the point where the enemies, walls, and other obstacles are coming at you with only the tiniest of conscious moments to decide how you’re going to react.

While it’s technically enough to survive the end of each stage, Hypership is a score attack game. Coins and power-ups can be readily found, the former increasing your score for the leaderboards and the latter giving you extra bombs, stronger guns, a forcefield to protect you from one hit, or even a very short-lived brake to slow down. Some are easy to grab, though many others require either expert timing and memorization of the level to reach, or using power-ups. Thus, surviving is one goal but truly mastering each stage is also encouraged.

For such a simple game, Hypership stands out by offering several different play modes. Your basic objective of getting through each level alive stays the same, but you get your choice of five different rules sets and the ability to reverse each stage. Normal mode is as has been described, while Hardcore mode gives you only one life to complete the entire game. A Coin mode requires you to constantly collect coins along the way as your fuel source, and a ’super speed’ mode where you don’t have a different speed limit for each stage. Finally, a practice mode lets you learn each level. Co-op play is also available for up to four players on the same system, but is optional.

Much of what has been said here can apply to the original game as well, so what primarily sets Hypership Still Out of Control apart from it is mostly a set of new levels. In this sense it is more of the same, but that’s absolutely fine when the core game mechanic is very enjoyable and the new stages are well made. Very nicely priced at $1 USD/80 Microsoft Points, this is one indie release that comes highly recommended!

This review is based on a retail copy of the Xbox LIVE version, provided by the developer.