EpiXR Video games are probably the most prolific sport publishers on the Xbox, releasing an Aery, Lifetime of Fly, Homicide Diaries or Paper Flight sport each month. However whereas they’re probably the most lively studios on the market, they’re additionally probably the most risk-averse. Every sport tends to be a rehash of the others, simply with a brand new wrapper slapped on the entrance.
That’s the knowledge we had been carrying into Paper Sprint – Ghost Hunt, and that knowledge has turned out to be incorrect – at the least on this case. We couldn’t be happier that we’ve been carrying the incorrect assumption. As a result of whereas Paper Sprint – Ghost Hunt isn’t a gaming revelation, and it’s definitely not going to web any huge scores, it lastly appears like dangers are being taken. As somebody who has reviewed just about each Aery-styled sport to launch on the Xbox, it feels good to not regurgitate the identical previous criticisms.
The title goes to confuse a couple of individuals. That is not a Paper Flight sport. That collection, additionally launched by EpiXR, has the participant maneuvering a paper aircraft by way of satan balloons, popping them with a well-timed press of the acceleration button. There aren’t any satan balloons and no crappy vitality system in Paper Sprint – Ghost Hunt. As a substitute, the paper aircraft is outfitted with some heavy ordnance and is taking pictures ghosts.
Now, it is a little bit of a heel flip for EpiXR Video games. The Aery collection specifically is chill, low-speed and anti-violence. It’s just about an ASMR sport for casuals, providing you with the tingles as you swoop by way of structure. To maneuver from sight-seeing to fight is gutsy. This isn’t a small change.
Very like the demon balloons of Paper Flight, ghosts bob on the horizon, ready in your strategy. You’ll be able to maintain A to hurry in direction of them along with your little aircraft, or maintain B to hit the brakes. Press RT and the firing occurs: a continuing volley of bullets that may attain midway throughout the extent to start out damaging the ghost. Small ghosts are likely to take three bullets to dispatch, greater ones take about ten. However as soon as they’re gone, the full for the wave goes down, and also you’re circling spherical to seek out the following lot of spectres.
Every degree is a sequence of waves, though waves implies that the ghosts transfer a la models in a Tower Protection. However they simply sit there, ready for dying (or undeath, we suppose, since they’re ghosts). They don’t fireplace or transfer. You merely get them in your sights and fireplace till they’ve blinked out of existence.
Which doesn’t fairly make Paper Sprint – Ghost Hunt an Ace Fight beater. Whereas we’re making an enormous factor of the firing, you have to be underneath no phantasm that that is nonetheless a laid-back flight sim. However whereas it’s redundantly straightforward, it needs to be famous that the firing does nonetheless handle to really feel good. Get a bead on a ghost, and you may regular the ship to kill it earlier than pivoting spherical to the following ghost. Many of the technique or problem comes from understanding which to assault first, and making an attempt to do away with all of them with out having to wheel spherical for a second assault.
What surprises most is that the taking pictures feels instinctive and issue-free. Certain, there aren’t any power-ups, secondary weapons or something like that, however what’s right here works completely. There aren’t any bugs within the taking pictures (when EpiXR have a historical past of buggy releases), which signifies that Paper Sprint – Ghost Hunt manages to discover a sweet-spot the place it’s not too intensive to alienate the Aery followers, but it’s obtained barely extra curiosity for individuals like me; individuals who anticipate an entire lack of ambition.
It’s nonetheless obtained points, and plenty of of these carry over from the opposite video games. The waves nonetheless really feel like synthetic lengthening: we had been exploring the identical areas three to 5 occasions over, with an growing variety of enemies slotting into the identical previous nooks of the extent. If the enemies tried one thing new with every wave, or if the extent developed over time – a drawbridge got here down and all of the sudden we had been exploring inside a fortress, not round it – then the problems could be mitigated. However principally it’s barely bigger enemies squatting within the seats of the ghosts that preceded them.
And should you’ve performed multiple EpiXR launch, you can be pointing on the ranges, screaming ‘I’ve performed this earlier than!’. We assume there’s one, solitary ‘new’ degree right here – a spooky carnival. However the remaining ten ranges are all replicated, of their entirety, from different video games. There was an deserted mansion that we recalled from an previous Aery, and we guessed that a whole wave would happen within the mansion’s attic. When you’ll be able to predict the place ghosts will probably be performed for a degree, then you definately’re in all probability doing one thing incorrect.
A standard blot on the EpiXR scorecard is bugs. Releasing month-to-month video games takes a toll on their video games, and so they usually have extra important points than they need to. In Paper Sprint – Ghost Hunt, there are some beauty points – an achievement popped effectively earlier than it ought to, and a few invisible partitions stopped us from taking shortcuts – however in any other case, it held up effectively. That is nearly probably the most polished of all of their trendy releases.
Which is to say that Paper Sprint – Ghost Hunt is one thing of a pleasing shock. Certain, it carries some foibles from Aery and the others, notably the reheated arenas and overuse of repetitive waves, however it warms our cockles to see how adventurous it’s. By slapping a machine gun on the entrance of a paper aircraft (aerodynamics be damned), Paper Sprint – Ghost Hunt manages so as to add an additional, barely extra strategic layer to its well-worn template. If it is a new perspective being proven by its developer, we’re effectively on board.
