San Francisco showcase unveils exciting new titles for PlayStation VR

At a recent showcase event in San Francisco, news.com.au got an exclusive look at PlayStation’s latest push into virtual reality gaming.

Console maker and games developer Sony is continuing to push its PlayStation VR offering with the announcement last week of several new games for the platform.

The State of Play showcase livestream announced the new games and was followed by an invitation only hands-on event in San Francisco where an exclusive group of media were able to try out the games for themselves. As one of the attendees, I was very impressed with what I experienced.

The hit of the event was undoubtedly Marvel’s Iron Man VR, a game which puts the player into Tony Stark’s ferrous rocket armour and lets them do all the cool stuff that Iron Man does — flying around, firing energy pulses from his hands, rescuing Pepper Potts from danger, and generally being awesome.

The movement controls were particularly effective once you got used to them, emulating how a real Iron Man suit would probably work (with thrusters in his hands and moving by positioning your body). I liked being able to use my hands to manoeuvre, juggling manoeuvring with needing those same hands to fire energy balls at things, and generally enjoying the sensation of actually feeling like a badass in rocket-armour.

Who doesn’t want to be Iron Man?

The demo, which involved getting the hang of the suit then fighting off a mysterious enemy attacking your private jet, was a lot of fun and I can see the game being very popular if the release version takes full advantage of its mechanics and the VR medium when it takes off later this year.

Chill space exploration game No Man’s Sky divided critics and fans at its release (I loved it, for the record) but it’s impossible to deny that it has been significantly added to and expanded upon since launch, adding a host of new features including base-building. The game is set to take another step forward with the No Man’s Sky Beyond update, which is a massive update bringing VR to the game.

The controls were surprisingly immersive — for example, to fly your spaceship you need to use the thrusters with your left hand while operating the joystick with your right hand. Getting out of the cockpit involves grabbing into the canopy handles and lifting them. Changing controls on your multi-tool involves looking at the tool (in your right hand) and using your left hand to change the settings.

The VR was great — you can look all around your spaceship cockpit too — with movement options including smooth and teleport. No Man’s Sky is already a solid and chill space exploration game, and VR kicked the experience up a notch again.

Even better, it’s coming as part of a massive free update to the game which is expected around the middle of the year — so get ready to don your space helmets again, because it looks to be quite a ride.

The other major release I tried out was Blood and Truth from London Studio, which is a first-person shooter in which your character plays a disgraced SAS operative who has been roped into what seems like a heist or deniable mission of some sort. The whole thing had a very Guy Ritchie movie feel about it, which I loved.

This was as much fun as it looks.

The demo took place as a flashback to an operation in the Middle East, where you infiltrate and terrorist base, shoot a lot of people, rescue your comrade, then shoot your way out from the window of a moving car.

The gunplay was superb and a lot of fun, and the game showed a lot of promise, so I can’t wait to play it when it releases on May 28.

It wasn’t all murder and mayhem at the showcase either, with a VR version of casual golf game Everybody’s Golf lined up too. It did exactly what it said on the tin, being a fun, relaxed and inviting golf game that was very easy to pick up and get into the swing of. I’m no good at real golf, but the Everybody’s Golf demo I played meant I can certainly see myself practising my virtual swing in my lounge when it tees off around June.

There’s something creepy about animatronic cartoon characters, which is why they’re so effective as the antagonists in the Five Nights At Freddy’s series of horror games.

The first game, originally released in 2014, casts you as a security guard at Freddy’s Fazbear’s family restaurant, which has a number of animatronic mascot characters that like to get up and go walkabout at night.

VR has the ability to get real spooky.

They also like the taste of hapless security guard, so you must remain in your control booth and use switches to control lights and cameras so you can detect these wandering horrors and close the booth doors before they get to you. Freddy is also pretty stingy on the power bill, so you’ve only got a finite amount of electricity available each night too — and when the power goes out, it’s all over for you.

What is already a spooky game is downright terrifying in VR, where you can hear the animatrons clanking around the restaurant and down the hall, but now you are really in the booth, freaking out about what’s in the dark beyond the range of your lights and cameras.

The experience was genuinely scary and definitely not one I’d want to be playing alone at night.

As well as the original game, Five Nights At Freddy’s VR: Help Wanted also includes an escape room puzzle as well as a several mini-games. It definitely looks to be one for atmospheric horror fans, whose shift begins in the later part of the year.

I rounded out the showcase with Trover Saves The Universe, which has been created by Justin Roiland — best known for his work with one of my favourite shows, Rick & Morty.

Rick and Morty fans won’t mind seeing this.

Developed by Squanch Studios, Trover Saves The Universe is a platformer in vaguely the same style as Astro Bot Rescue Mission, with your character playing a chair-bound alien whose dogs have been kidnapped to be a power source for an evil alien and you’re roped into an adventure with reluctant partner Trover to get them back.

The art style, writing and humour (as well as the voice acting) is classic Rick & Morty, so if you’re a fan of that show this one definitely needs to be on your radar — and it’ll be available on May 31.

Royce Wilson attended the PSVR Showcase as a guest of Sony

Originally published as San Francisco showcase unveils exciting new titles for PlayStation VR