Rush is the best way to wingsuit dive inside of virtual reality. Rush is also the best way to get motion sick in VR in less than 20 seconds. If you are familiar with virtual reality, you know that skydiving inside of a headset isn’t the best idea, and you also know that controls and locomotion matter. The Binary Mill gaming studio had a fantastic idea with their game Rush, but the medium and execution matter. This game falls short with a grand idea, following suit with the studio’s other games.
In this game review, we will be touching on every aspect of a virtual reality game that matters. From the game setting to the kinetosis, this is a know-all guide that will help you know if you should spend your money on this game and your virtual time inside of this game. If you have Viveport Infinity, this game is worth downloading to try out, then deleting. If you don’t have the Infinity subscription, save yourself the $19.99 and blindfold yourself while laying in the back of a bus instead.
Getting Up and Running
In our in-depth game review series, we will be including the process of getting the game on your PC to the end of an hour. From start to finish, these are observations and notes from our hour with Rush. Unless The Binary Mill put a new un-lockable locomotion system inside the game after an hour, these will be our final thoughts on the wingsuit diving game.
If you have an internet connection of 10 Mbps, you can expect the download of this 5GB game to take upwards of an hour to finish. Comparatively, if you have internet capable of 100 Mbps, you could get your full copy of the game in less than ten minutes. Installing the game is as simple as any other VR game. It can be found on the Steam Store and the Viveport Store, and of September 2019, it is part of the Infinity subscription. It also is on the Play Store for the PSVR games users out there.
Once on your PC in whichever file you choose, you can launch the game inside of SteamVR. From there, you will be thrown (literally) into a world that has no regards for your stomach, or kinetosis in general.
Type of Game
This game is a racing game, and anyone who argues that point isn’t having much fun with Rush. There are other game modes in the game, but the best is the racing mode. Here, you can race against the artificial intelligence and in the online multiplayer section. This isn’t the best game for your friends online, as there is no voice chat. Your vehicle is your body and your steering wheel is your arms. It is an experience that you won’t soon forget. This is cross-platform compatible too, so you are sure to never be waiting too long in the lobby.
In this sports racing game, so you aren’t going to be armed with any explosives or knives to cut up your competition. In Rush, your competitors are working towards the same goal as you are, but all with different tactics. Some are hugging the ground to maintain quickness with the sacrifice visibility of the upcoming map. Some are hovering above the tree line while seeing the map as a whole while sacrificing the quickness the lower air provides. Whichever tactic you choose you need to hit checkpoints as you descend to the bottom of the mountain.
These checkpoints will give you the route you will be following, making the map unique to the last one you raced on. Whether you are racing the other players or your previous time, you will be looking to shave time off any way you can. You will be able to use your boost after passing through two consecutive checkpoints, but all players possess this ability. This is featured in time attack, and all other modes. Even Learning to use your boost at the right time on the right point of the mountain is imperative to taking the lead inside of your races. This is the epitome of a simple sports racing game in virtual reality. No curve balls here.
Player Perspective
This game is in first-person, but it could’ve truly benefited from a different perspective. I believe this game would’ve been rated much higher if the perspective was different, as this is what causes most of the problems in this game. You will be looking out the goggles (same shape of your VR headset) in your suit this entire game, and it gets very old very fast. When you’re launching downwards but your eyes shoot up to see the next checkpoint down mountain, the goggles block out your view. It is either all black at the top of your screen, or just the edge of your goggles. This only depends on your flying projection. This is also a problem when propelling yourself upwards while trying to look down. First-person can cause a problem in many games, and Rush magnifies them more than most video games.
The motion sickness in this game is brought by perspective. If you were sitting on your couch playing this game on your phone or gaming console, it would be incredible fun. This is a fantastic idea for an iOS or Android app. The problem is what you are seeing. Every minimal jerk and turn puts you in a state of motion sickness. If you were in a third or second-person view, this game would still be very playable inside of VR. The fact this game has a “Very Positive” review on Steam tells you everything you need to know. It is a great thrill, but the execution is off.
Theme and Story
N/A
Controls
The controls of this game are going to take you on a roller coaster while you try to figure out what works for you. During our hour of gameplay, we tried out the native controls for the first half-hour, and the other five for the remaining time. With that being said, the native and recommended controls are simply awful. Finding my groove in this quest was when I tried out the point-to-fly and the rotating controller methods of flying. Nobody wants to have their arms out in a T pose for more than 30 seconds, especially when they are holding motion controllers. The more simple it was to control my avatar, the more fun I had. Although there wasn’t much fun had inside of this game, it came at the end of the run when the controls finally started to feel natural.
Score: 3/10
Music & Sound Effects
When you get close to the ground or fly over the edge of a cliff the sound was surprisingly accurate at capturing when a real wing suit pro would hear. We don’t know what they exactly hear, but it is what us nerds would like to assume they hear while they are flying over mountains. This game has roughly three different instrumental songs that play throughout the entire gameplay, and it just didn’t cut it. You would often feel like you were in groundhogs day with the same music and resembling tracks. The reality is that this game didn’t do enough to make me not want to turn my own music on. The sound effects were enough for this to get a few points here, but the developers need to take more initiative with the music. If no one will be talking in this game and there is no interaction, at least give us some music with words and something that will pass the time while we feel sick inside of VR.
Score: 4/10
Player Movement
This game can be played either sitting or standing. We played while we were standing, but we doubt there would be a different result in how we felt if we were sitting. You won’t be needing your room scale set up in this game, and if you stand, your feet will be firmly planted for the entirety of your experience. The player movement itself inside of the game is automatic. Once you launch, you will be going forward no matter what. From there, you are only controlling the angle at which you are flying. This is incredibly important as you are zig-zagging down the mountain to victory. After you do cross the finish line, your character will automatically deploy his parachute and jumper strap. This will cause you to feel like you are thrown backward with a headset on, which is not pleasant. The action of shooting off of the platform feels like an unfinished product as well, but still gets the job done.
Score: 6/10
Kinetosis
We love VR, we love our settled stomachs, and just like riding passenger to a bad driver, you aren’t happy when you’re taken for a ride that makes you feel sick. This game is at the peak of causing motion sickness. The distance between what the player sees and what the player feels couldn’t be greater. Flight simulators are great for virtual reality for a learning purpose, but no one should learn how to wingsuit glide from this game. It will scare them away and force them to make a stop a garbage can before applying for their real flying license. It was a challenge to stay in Rush for more than 15 minutes. This game would’ve been better off as a mobile device game, or console game with a story.
Score: 1/10
Environment and Immersion
There are a few flaws in this section of this game, but none that are disruptive. The reason this is going to be scored so high is two reasons. 1. The game had a few bright spots, and the views and surroundings were one of them. 2. The rest of the game was bad, this was bearable, so we will reward the score for that. Although we didn’t get great views of the mountains and deserts because of the speed this game is played at, we saw enough while at terminal velocity to know there was some above-average time spent in this department. The details aren’t as good as The Climb VR, but they are enough to make you feel like you have been outside in the past month. This game also features real-time weather, but it is often spotty and inaccurate. Its still a fun feature, but needs to be refined if there is another thrill ride version of the game on the horizon.
Score: 8/10
Overall
This game is a brilliant idea that was poorly executed by the developers at The Binary Mill. If you can get this game for free from a subscription, it is worth at least trying it out. If you find yourself reaching for your credit card at any time while buying the game for full price, give us a call and we would be happy to have you try it out on our account first. $19.99 of real or virtual money is a lot. We cannot fully recommend buying this game at the full price, but we think it is worth a shot. There is a reason it has 4.5 stars on the Steam Store, so go ahead and give it a shot and tell us what you think in the comments below.
