Phobos Vector Prime PS4 Review

Phobos vector prime The First Ring is the 80s inspired arcade style 3rd person shooter from indie developer Gunstar Studios. Shooting stuff with lasers while listening to a synthwave soundtrack is pretty fun.

You play as J.L Brown, a soldier fresh out of cryo-sleep who is trying to track down his brothers in arms only to uncover some dark secrets.

The game incorporates a bullet hell style of gameplay mechanics. This requires precise use of shields and dodging to stay alive. The real challenge in this games comes with playing on the harder difficulty. Like the arcade games of old, if you die there are no checkpoints, you have to start the level all over again. You can also buy into some challenges if you want such as beating the level within a specific time frame, find and destroy all enemy supplies or score a determined amount of points.

You start the game with a basic laser attack but you can pick up power-ups scattered across the levels which have limited ammo. You will also unlock some additional powers such as a shock wave and an electric shield that damages enemies near you. These work on a cooldown timer once unlocked.

I found the game to be challenging in paces and I actually found the mix of gameplay and music quite relaxing. Although there can be some vibrant moments with lasers and explosions cascading their way across the black backdrop of space, I would have liked to have seen some different colour tones and environmental design choices to the six levels, and more variety of enemy types. I am aware this is only the 1st part of the campaign and Gunstar Studios could potentially choose a different location in space with a different set of enemies and challenges for the next instalment.

I also felt the game lacked a good selection of weapon types and both the L2 and R2 triggers had no use. It could be that the developer wanted to keep the weapon selection basic to be more authentic to the original genre but I think to add balance to what gamers expect nowadays there needs to be more weapon variety.

Phobos vector prime will have a multiplayer online battle arena coming soon to the game where 6 players can team up in 2 groups of 3 to duke it out in frantic space battles. With how short the first part of the campaign is I would have liked this mode to be implemented but this will be added at a later time with a patch.

Overall my time playing the game has been fun and nostalgic. The soundtrack made me want to watch some classic 80s movies and for a price of only £7.99, this is one for your collection.

Phobos vector prime the First ring is available on PS4 Make sure you follow the developer on Twitter @GunstarStudio for updates on the game and you can check out their website HERE

Our Video Review of the game can be seen below.

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