This is an Early Access Review and as such opinions are based solely on the state of the game at the time of review and subject to change as development progresses leading up to final release.
Speedy Gun Savage is an entertaining new VR arcade game that hearkens back to the classic coin-op days of Time Crisis; you know the genre, the on-rails shooter that automatically propels the player forward from one cover spot to the next for fast and furious shootout encounters. In this game you’ll be playing as an intergalactic bounty hunter, as you travel to three unique planets, each with its own army of enemies you’ll need to defeat leading up to a planetary boss fight.
Originally released to Early Access back in April, the game was pretty rough when it debuted so I decided to give it a few months to sort itself out. Thankfully, there have been a couple patches since then and I’m happy to say that even in this stage of development there is still considerable fun to be had with Speedy Gun Savage. Available on Steam, you can play this wild and crazy shooter on the Vive and the Rift. I tested both and ultimately settled on the Rift S version as my favorite due to more comfortable controls and slightly improved visuals, but both versions are nearly identical in every other way. The Oculus Touch controls do feel a bit more natural than the Vive wands when wielding your weapons.
So you play as Wolf, equipped with dual wielding pistols and shotguns or you can whip out the big gun and unleash a stream of deadly machinegun fire. Your faithful companion bot 3V4N (Evan) is always floating nearby to offer insight and comedic relief to the situation. Speedy Gun Savage is designed to be a very approachable rail-shooter with colorful art design, interesting levels, amusing (and dangerous) enemies, and a great UI with intuitive icons and collectibles.
The game flows nicely with Wolf moving from cover to cover. Once in position several enemies will appear, some in towers, some standing in the open and others tumbling side to side or right at you. There is a nice variety of enemies between the stages and planets. Giant insects are mixed in with cowboys while crazy skeletons will fire flaming arrows or rush at you strapped with explosives and drones will zip around overhead. Environmental targets are scattered about along with power-ups for health and ammo. During these shooting encounters you are “stuck” to your cover but can freely move side to side or physically look up and over or beneath certain cover items using your body. In one early level there was a gap under the rock, and I was able blast the ankles off two cowboys. There is definitely a bit of tactics involved in prioritizing enemies, shooting the suicide bombers before they reach you and trying to shoot archers and gunmen while they are reloading.
Once each encounter is cleared you activate the nearby traversal icon and you automatically start to move forward until you get stuck behind your next bit of cover. During this forward motion you can move side to side and even stop short of your next encounter by moving behind an object in the level. You are free to spin completely around but enemies don’t seem to appear from behind, although you can turn and shoot any missed power-ups that are still in range.
There is a fair but steep progression of difficulty with a lot of trial and error to figure out the best pattern for killing enemies even when some encounters do change up, mostly based on your location behind the cover. For instance, the suicide bombers will always appear and approach based on which side of the cover you are hiding. Static enemies like snipers in towers and archers will always appear in the same place so you can learn and get better. Also figuring out which weapons work best against certain enemies and situations also comes into play. Aiming is challenging since there is no floating reticle, and you must use your tracers to zero in on your enemies.
The visual design for Speedy Gun Savage is really fun and colorful with great enemy designs, animations, and details. The characters and environments are very nice with a visual step-up from cel-shading but still maintaining an original artistic flavor stuck between reality and graphic novel. The UI is non-invasive with your health meter built into your wrist and your ammo count displayed on the guns. Your spaceship provides a fun hub area between levels/worlds, and there is even an arcade machine to offer up some classic high scoring gameplay for the leaderboards.
Speedy Gun Savage can be played seated or standing, but as the levels progress you’ll probably want to stand so you have more flexibility for peeking over or kneeling behind cover. The game can get quite physical if you let it. The game does support Room-Scale but aside from moving around behind cover this is very limited as everything is on rails. As mentioned earlier, the Touch controls feel more natural when using the guns, but both systems offer excellent tracking and accurate aiming. Even your body/head is tracked so you can dodge the slower incoming projectiles just like in SUPERHOT.
I had a great time playing Speedy Gun Savage and I look forward to seeing how it all progresses leading up to launch. Fingers crossed for more planets and enemies as this did feel like a taste of a possible larger game, but even at $10 you’ll definitely get your money’s worth. The devs seem to acknowledge feedback and several updates have fixed and even added new content like the new quick draw Duel Challenge. Another great update is the Wave Challenge where you can freely move about without sticking to cover objects as you face off against wave after wave of enemies.
If you are craving some awesome arcade shooting action then no need to wait for Speedy Gun Savage to come out of Early Access. It is totally playable and totally awesome in its current state and likely only going to get better over the coming months. Definitely worth checking out if you have a Rift or Vive.
We’ll be back to update our review when the game officially launches.
