All Enemies And Bosses In Battle Talent And Tips For Fighting Them

Battle Talent has quite a few enemies in it that I’ll put into a few broad categories. These are fantasy creatures, the Undead, and Humans. Here I’m going to go through all of them and give a tip or two on how to fight them.

So here’s every Battle Talent enemy and Battle Talent boss that you’ll fight in this VR game.

As you’re reading this keep in mind that a lot of these enemies have elite variants that are tougher than usual. If you see one (you can tell by the glowing red eyes and heavily armored body) just assume they’ll be stronger, tougher, and faster than the usual enemy but they will generally follow the same behavior as well as use heavy attacks that must be deflected to be blocked. (Deflecting is when you hit an incoming enemy blow with your weapon, hard, like attacking their weapon with your weapon.)

Fantasy Creatures - Goblins

The first enemies you’ll come across in the dungeon or adventure modes of Battle Talent are going to be goblins.

They’re decent starting enemies. Outside of the amped up elite variants they will go down pretty easily with a few solid hits, and most don’t attack extremely often. Though when goblins do attack they have a tendency to go around and behind you to attack your back.

Goblins come in two variants, little guys and big guys. Let’s talk about the little guys first.

Lil’ Goblins

Little Goblins

Little goblins are short, fragile, and not too bright. While they might have a little club or blade to hit you with most variants prefer to fight from far away with ranged weapons.

Their ranged weapons are daggers or bombs. The daggers can be swatted out of the air and don’t deal much damage if they hit you. The bombs have a very limited blast radius and hurt your enemies just like they hurt you, but they do deal a ton of damage, so be wary of them.

Little goblins love to try and duck and dive out of your way to avoid being hit, but they’re really not much trouble as long as you don’t completely ignore them. Take them out in a strike or two quickly so that they can’t sneak up on you. Little goblins are hopeless in a straight up fight.

Big Goblins

A big goblin

Big goblins are quite a bit more dangerous than their smaller cousins. They use more crude goblin weaponry like swords and clubs, and while they will actually sometimes block incoming blows by holding their blades in front of them their defense is very poor and they aren’t hard to take down. They will also throw daggers when given the chance just like little goblins, but not bombs.

The basic big goblin with a single weapon isn’t much of a threat, but they can quickly strike you if you’re not careful, and all big goblins will try to walk close to you to attack you. Goblins with two weapons and some armor are more elite and tend to be harder to take down and also very fast.

The big goblins’ favorite move is to dash around you and attack you from the sides or rear. The more armed and armored the goblin then the more likely they are to dash and attack you. Stay mobile and don’t let them get behind you. In frontal confrontations, they’re not the most dangerous enemies, but a group of them attacking at once can confuse you and attack from all directions. They love getting behind you.

A goblin shaman

Goblins also have shamans with a wand that lets them summon rocks from the ground and fling them at you. They’re mostly harmless as long as you see their spells coming and don’t stand in the path of the rocks.

They will mostly just try to back away from you in melee range. So get close to the shamans and chop them up. Just like little goblins, they’re only a threat if you completely ignore them.

White Goblins

A white goblin boss in Battle Talent

White goblins are basically just boss versions of big goblins. They’re bigger, tougher, stronger, have glowing red eyes, and are easily recognizable for their tallness and pale skin.

They wield dual blades and will dash around quickly to attack. They will also chain attacks into big combos of sweeping strikes, often ending with a strong attack that must be deflected to be blocked.

The good thing about the white goblins’ huge and consistent attacks is that deflecting them is fairly easy because not only do they attack quickly and often, but they swing their weapons in a wide arc. So just generally swinging your own weapon towards them while they are attacking will generally net you enough deflections to stun them and then quickly deal a lot of damage while they are stunned and defenseless.

Fantasy Creatures - Orcs

An orc boss in Battle Talent VR

Orcs in Battle Talent VR aren’t common enemies that you’ll see sprinkled into most fights, rather they’re boss monsters that will have their own arena dedicated to them.

You can tell an orc by their pale skin and huge stature. Not to mention their gigantic muscles and square heads.

Both orc variants carry large two handed weapons, a sword or a hammer, and they have similar movesets. Generally, the orc will lumber towards you, and when they get close will charge up a huge swing and release a combination attack on you. These massive swings are hard to deflect and hard to dodge.

As with many enemies that have attacks that are difficult to dodge, and many boss enemies, your best options are to either play keep away and quickly get away as they try to attack, strike once or twice, and then run away again, or use a charge attack deflect during one of their swings to stun them. (A charge deflect is when you hold your weapon over your shoulder until it vibrates to charge it, and then swing your weapon into the enemy’s swinging weapon to deflect it as usual.)

If you’re standing in the path of an Orc’s attack combination you’re probably going to take massive damage, except possibly with a shield held in front of you. So either don’t be there, hide behind a shield (which isn’t always effective), or deflect the attack.

Fantasy Creatures - Dark Elves

A dark elf enemy

Dark Elves are basically big goblins that don’t throw daggers, and attack you from the front more than dashing around you. They favor big sweeping sword attacks that leave their heads exposed. So go for the head.

The Undead - Basic Skeletons

A basic skeleton Battle Talent enemy with some armor

Skeletons are the most basic undead enemy, and you’ll start to see them once you’ve gotten tired of just fighting goblins for a while.

Skeletons tend to come in large packs, and they’ll march straight toward you without pausing to reposition or throw ranged attacks. They’re very mindless, and once a skeleton gets close they’ll just swing their weapon wildly at you. If you try to back away they’ll just keep walking towards you and swinging their weapon if you’re in range.

So skeletons are always predictable in a fight, and despite the array of medieval armor and weapons they use, are mostly fragile. While they can be chopped, blunt weapons like maces seem to be the most effective against them. Knocking their heads off is an easy way to take them out, and even deflecting one of their blows can turn them into a pile of bones.

Magic like the fireball spell is especially effective against skeletons and can destroy a whole pack of them in an instant. Though some skeletons are magical, which you can usually tell by them keeping their distance from you and not carrying a weapon. These skeletons will summon dark balls of energy that will track and follow you but can be neutralized by swatting them in the air with a weapon.

Some magical skeletons can even summon a stream of fire from their palm that they’ll point toward you like a flamethrower. Stay far away from the fire as it does a lot of damage quickly. Get behind the skeleton and bash them to pieces.

Just like goblin shamans the magical skeletons are very weak in melee range and will mostly just try to back away from you. So get close and knock them to pieces.

The Undead - Big Skeletons

A big skeleton

Big skeletons operate a lot like Skeletons, but a little smarter, a lot tougher, and much more dangerous.

Big Skeletons are not only taller than you but always have armor and most likely a shield. They also won’t fall apart in a single strike to the head. Big skeletons also have charged attacks that can only be deflected rather than blocked, so they function as the elite version of basic skeletons.

Instead of just taking them down quickly with a blunt weapon or magic, try deflecting their attacks to stun them or hit them quickly before running away from their attacks. Hit and run is very effective on big skeletons. Though their sweeping strikes are usually pretty easy to deflect, though their charge attacks are less so, especially when they bash you with their shield.

One of the elite Skeleton boss enemies. Recognizable because of his big cape

However, there are some fully armored Big Skeletons with capes (aka “vampires”) that are very fast and will attack you pretty quickly.

The caped skeletons also can instantly summon a ton of those dark energy balls that hone in on you. Just like when fighting most bosses it’s usually easiest to just deflect their attacks until they are stunned, and then deal massive damage to them.

The Undead - Wraiths

A Wraith

There are three varieties of wraith in Battle Talent, and I suggest you use the same tactic against all of them.

You can always tell a wraith by the fact that they’re the only enemies that float instead of walk with legs and that they’re pretty ugly and scary-looking like Halloween decorations. Their primary attack is a charge. They’ll psyche themselves up, and then fly in a straight line towards you while swinging their weapon wildly. Just run out of the way if one is coming at you and you’ll be fine. They don’t change course mid-attack and just go in a straight line.

Luckily wraiths aren’t as dangerous as they look. No matter which kind you come across they are basically hopeless at short ranges. Just strafe around them so you’re not in front of them and whack them in the head. They’ll go down easily.

A robed wraith

All wraiths also have magical attacks. The robed wraiths will summon ice to hit you, and the unrobed wraiths can call a stream of fire from their palms, which does a lot of damage.

When a wraith uses magic just get behind them and hit them until they fall or stop.

One of the white robed wraith Battle Talent bosses

The White Wraith is just a boss version of the other two sorts of wraiths. They’ll attack more often and have access to a variety of magical attacks.

Get close to them to hit them quickly, and then back away when they start attacking. Deflections are hard to pull off against this boss so hit and run attacks are more effective.

Humans

A human warrior enemy

Humans look, well, human. They’re generally very muscular and wear some light armor, though none come as heavily armored as goblins or the undead do. Human opponents come in a lot of varieties. In fact, that’s the most notable thing about them.

Out of all Battle Talent enemies, none of them have the variety of weapon types that the human opponents bring to the table, and that’s what makes it hard to give precise advice on how to combat them. Different weapon types come with different movesets. Humans with swords will slash, though not as wildly or widely as goblins do.

Humans with maces tend to do longer ranged dashing attacks, and human enemies of all kinds will slowly walk around in front of you until they see an opening, but not jump around wildly and try to get behind you as goblins do. On the other hand, they don’t just march straight for you and attack like skeletons, humans function like a mix of the stubbornness of skeletons and the tricky nature of the goblins.

Female human enemies using magic

There are some female human enemies, the most common of which are the ranged magical casters. Each carries an ice wand and will use it constantly to try to hit you with ice at range. Like other casters, they are hopeless in close combat. Just get close and take them down. The same goes for the female archer enemies. Just don’t let them hit you at range, and get close.

There are also bigger humans like there are of other enemies, and just like with those they are just generally tougher and faster, though most function a lot like their smaller counterparts. Though for humans specifically there is a Samurai sort of version wearing a canonical hat and wielding a katana that does a lot of charged attacks and will even attack you at range with magical wind strikes.

A samurai enemy

They’re also very tough, but as long as you aren’t directly in front of them when they attack you should be alright. Their blows are fast and hard to deflect, so just try to stay to their sides or rear so they don’t hit you.

Finally, there are the pale skinned boss humans. The same strategy that works on the white goblins works on them. Try to keep them in front of you and deflect their attacks to get an opening. They attack constantly and quickly.

The Final Boss

The Final Boss in Battle Talent

The final boss is, unsurprisingly, the most dangerous enemy in Battle Talent by a long shot. He wields a giant sword, is armored almost everywhere, and is only vulnerable to the same thing all bosses are vulnerable to, deflections. Except for the final boss, you’ll have to deflect more than ever to stun him.

He hits hard, he’s fast, and he summons lighting. The final boss will try to dash around to get behind you and strike with his sword. He will also charge up attacks that can only be deflected, and is generally fast and hard-hitting, though not the fastest. If you’re really on the ball his attacks are dodgeable, but they will keep coming.

The lightning that the final boss summons does a ton of damage, but you can tell when he’s summoning it because he will pause for a moment and raise his hand up slowly. Don’t be near him when he does this.

Otherwise do some great deflections, be fast on your feet, and get your hits in while you can. The final boss of Battle Talent can strike back at you even directly after completing another attack, so move quickly.

There you go, all of the Battle Talent VR enemies and Battle Talent VR bosses, hopefully this helps you out in your fights. Good luck and enjoy!

Complete Battle Talent VR Controls Guide And A Few Tips

Want to know the controls in the awesome VR Fighting Game Battle Talent VR?

Well, look no further because here they are, and a couple of tips for Battle Talent.

This guide assumes that you are using the default controls setup, and your controls can be changed in the settings menu that you can open by pressing the yellow button on your left wrist in the game, or when starting the game.

These controls also assume you are playing the game using a Meta Quest headset and therefore use the Oculus touch controller button layout. Different VR controller types will still have similar buttons that will work in the same fashion.

The Battle Talent Controls

Left Joystick - Move in the direction that you point the joystick in. Pump your arms up and down (as though you’re running) to increase your movement speed and run in the game (this can be changed in the settings menu). Pressing in on the left joystick also dodges backward if you have the dodge talent unlocked.

Right Joystick - Turn by pointing it left or right, either snap or smooth depending on your options. Pulling the right joystick backward also dodges if you have the dodge talent. Pressing the right joystick forward kicks if you have the Kick talent.

Grip buttons - Holds an item with your hand, and also distance grabs an item if you see the circle around its grip while you hover your hand over that item to get its description. Grip a holster to take the item out of it. You can also grab enemies and tear them apart with the appropriate talent, or just grab them without the talent, though this won’t work on tougher or larger opponents. There is even a special holster on your chest for potions.

Trigger - Activate the special ability of a weapon held in your hand. Opens or closes a potion bottle if the hand is holding a potion. If you have a spell gem in that hand and aren’t holding a weapon holding down the trigger will cast the spell in the gem. Pressing the trigger also selects things in in-game menus.

B - Jump, also skips dialog.

Y - Slow motion if you have the slow motion talent.

Oculus Button - Open the Oculus/Meta menu as in any Quest game.

Battle Talent Tips

As you can see in the controls above you’ll need to pump your arms to run, unless you change the arm swing options in the settings.

I recommend that you keep the arm swinging option on because it makes the movement in this game much more immersive and interesting during combat. Having to pump your arms to run keeps you from accidentally running too close to enemies before fighting them, which is a very common problem in VR Fighting Games.

However, it can be a little annoying when you’re holding a two handed weapon using both of your hands.

You might naturally think that the best option here is to let go of your two handed weapon with one of your hands so that both can move independently, but you don’t have to do this to run in Battle Talent while holding a two handed weapon.

Instead, you can move your arms up and down while still holding the weapon, which lets you run while maintaining your grip. Just keep holding on and move one hand up while moving the other downwards.

Just like you can swing your arms to run faster, if you swing your arms while jumping you will jump higher! This is especially useful for parkour challenges or jumping over gaps in dungeons.

Running by swinging your arms in Battle Talent VR

One final note, pay attention to how you’re blocking your opponents’ attacks. Some attacks will also cause the enemy’s weapon to have red particles dance along it.

Those red attacks can only be blocked by “deflecting” it. Deflecting an attack is done by swinging at your opponent’s weapon while they are swinging. This will not only block any attack but also stun most enemies. This also works on normal attacks! Deflecting attacks makes fighting bosses in Battle Talent much easier.

That’s it for the Battle Talent Controls and also a few tips about the game. If you have any more tips to share feel free to post them in the comments. Enjoy!

A Fantastic VR Hunting Game - Virtual Hunter Review

Doing actual, real life hunting, sounds pretty hard.

I mean think about it, you have to get all the gear, which must be expensive, and get a license.

Then you have to wait for the right time of year, drive out to your nearest hunting ground, and then avoid being shot by somebody else while you wait for hours, maybe all day, for an animal to appear.

Then you have to shoot another living creature, which doesn't sound easy either, and even in the best case scenario, you have a whole carcass you have to haul off and eat or whatever.

I've never actually been hunting, so any real hunters out there feel free to correct me in the comments, but all of that sounds pretty hard and time consuming.

Hunting gear varies a lot, and there is a lot of different equipment you can use in Virtual Hunter

So as a VR gamer, and if you're seeing this you can probably relate, I'd much rather get all of the highs and lows of the hunting experience by strapping my Meta Quest 3 to my face and doing a little virtual hunting in VR. At least that was my thought process when trying out Virtual Hunter for the first time.

There are hunting flatscreen games out there, plenty over the years, but a VR hunting game was something I hadn't experienced before running across Virtual Hunter, so I was intrigued. Needless to say, since I've written this article about it, Virtual Hunter kept being intriguing and is a really unique VR experience.

Sure, there are other VR games where you do some hunting, but that's not the core of those games and the hunting mechanics are pretty straightforward. In this VR Hunting Game, hunting is all of the game, and that focus made it very fun. So to explain the feeling of playing Virtual Hunter it would be easiest to just tell you the story of my first successful hunt.

Tracking your prey is a huge part of Virtual Hunter

Virtual Reality Hunting In Virtual Hunter

For the record, this wasn't my first Virtual Reality hunt in this game, just my first successful hunt. At this point, I'd spent an hour at least just running through the woods chasing animal calls and not even spotting a single critter or firing a shot.

My successful hunt started off with a little luck, and after finding some fox tracks and hearing a fox noise in the distance, I was on the trail. Sure this wasn't big game or anything, but we all have to start somewhere. I was very cautious trailing this fox. I didn't want to go too quickly and possibly scare it off. So I took my time, and followed.

Though when tracking this fox in Virtual Hunter I never felt bored, despite doing mostly nothing but walking in a straight line and looking through my scope from time to time. I actually felt pretty excited. There was a constant sense of anticipation. I felt that at any moment I might actually spot my elusive pray. I followed the tracks, found some droppings, and the fox calls kept coming from closer and closer.

Following the fox’s trail

After following it for a while, I didn't even know how long, I spotted it. The excitement at not shooting, but just seeing the animal I was following was incredible. I'd actually done it, tracked an animal successfully, and it was in plain sight in a large field. A more experienced hunter might have gone prone, crawled a little closer, and really lined up their shot to hit something vital.

I, being a very inexperienced hunter, immediately lined up and fired. Something in the back of my brain panicked and thought that just by the act of my seeing it the fox would realize I was behind it and run away. I thought that I should just take the shot and risk it, which was a bad idea. I did hit the fox at least, but not in any vital organs. So it ran away. I saw it run and immediately chased after it.

The chase after a shot is another exhilarating part of VR hunting. My prey left a trail of blood and poop, they always seem to poop a lot after you shoot them in this game.

I was right on the fox’s tail and sprinted across the field. The blood trail was even easier to follow. I tracked with more urgency, maybe too quickly, but after a short chase, I spotted it once again across a field, about to enter some trees. It was a long shot for me, but I lined it up and took it anyway.

Just spotting an animal was incredibly hard in Virtual Hunter, but also incredibly rewarding

I looked through my scope after rechambering another round and saw the fox just lying there. I ran over, not really believing that I'd done it. Succeeding just once had taken me a couple of hours, but the feeling of success after having to try so hard to get it was so worth the effort.

Virtual Hunter shows you where and what you hit with your shots, and it wasn't surprising that I'd missed all vital organs with both hits, but on a fox two bullets alone were enough.

Since a fox is a small animal it wasn't worth much in ingame currency, but that didn't really matter to me. What mattered were the highs and lows of the tracking and the chase. Since then I've repeated this process quite a few times on quite a few animals.

Two hits, but that was enough

Not all animals are the same, and there are enough differences in them and the terrain you hunt them in that it keeps things interesting, but even though most of the game is just walking through the woods, it's not boring. The sense of anticipation is constant when you're on an animal's trail.

The feeling that at any moment you might spot one and take your shot, and then the aftermath of that shot, is what keeps this game from being more than a walking simulator. It doesn’t get old, it honestly just gets better as you find more types of animals and unlock more options in the store.

That's why Virtual Hunter is the Best VR Hunting Game around. It's also really the only VR hunting game around, and it's still in development with regular updates.

The only part of Virtual Hunter that I’d say is boring in this review could be when you wander around and aren’t actively tracking an animal. This period of the game is usually short, but you’re really waiting for something to happen, which isn’t terribly interesting. Though the waiting does make hearing an animal call or finding some tracks feel all the more exciting.

There is also some jankiness due to the unfinished nature of the game, and you might have noticed that it doesn't look the best graphically, though some of that can be blamed on me streaming the game to a Meta Quest 3, which doesn't work the best with unoptimized games.

So Virtual Hunter still needs some work to be all that it can be, I won't deny that, but the jankiness that it has I've happily ignored to experience the thrill of the hunt while standing in my living room. It's a unique VR experience that I never thought I would enjoy so much.

New AI In Swordsman VR Breathes Life Back Into This VR Sword Fighting Game

So, Swordsman VR just released a new experimental update that brings big improvements to the combat AI in the game. This new experimental AI feature makes them much more responsive in combat and brings the enemies in Swordsman VR much closer to the feeling of sword fighting an actual opponent.

When I was fighting the improved AI opponents I felt that they defended themselves much better than they used to. Despite the fact that a lot of their attacks still seem to be predetermined animations, they definitely still responded with their attacks in response to what you were doing in a much better way.

An AI Samurai blocking an incoming attack in Swordsman VR.

For instance, if you would go for a risky lunge trying to stab an enemy under the armpit, they would counterattack if they weren't in a good position to defend your thrust. Otherwise, unless their sword was way out of position, they would often be able to at least attempt to block or repost your attacks. This is much different from how fighting the AI in Swordsman VR used to feel and play.

Once you got the hang of the game, the enemies felt a lot like punching bags, where the only challenge was to not get hit when they attacked, and then stab them immediately. Their defense was terrible. Now, their ability to have a back and forth with you when you're fighting makes them feel a lot more like an actual opponent. Their ability to reliably block your incoming attacks makes them both more formidable and more interesting.

With this AI update, Swordsman VR feels a lot more like actual fencing. You'll attack, and if it's not a very good attack, especially when your opponent is ready to block you, they'll often swipe your blade out of the way.

The AI have become much better at defending themselves. After they block, they'll often riposte with an attack of their own, and sometimes they'll stay defensive. Each sword fight is more situational, and not as predictable as it used to be.

There are still some problems with the AI reacting to more dishonorable tactics, however. Rushing in with a shield to block off their sword arm while wildly stabbing them up close still worked too well. It would have been better if the AI backed off if you got too close and they were clearly at a disadvantage.

Bullying an enemy with a shield in Swordsman VR

So, it's definitely not perfect yet. Still, the enemies have a much better defense, they'll see your attacks coming, and they'll also attack you when you're not ready for it a lot more. These are all great improvements. However I did run into a bug where the bosses would basically blow up the moment I engaged them, and I would win automatically. Bugs are to be expected with big changes, though this was a very bad bug. Undoubtedly it will be fixed soon.

The one big complaint I have so far is how enemies defend their legs. I still felt like the enemies did not do a great job defending their legs, which, if you've played Swordsman VR, you know is their primary weak point. The one strategy that I could always use without fail would be to duck really low, and just stab the AI in the legs constantly.

Maybe the AI would advance a little and get a swipe on the back of your head, but when they're trying to block down low, it's like they can't quite cover all of their legs and their feet. The legs are still a major weak point for the enemies. They should have weak points that you can exploit, sure, but you should only be able to exploit them under circumstances that you create to make the fight more favorable to you.

You shouldn't be able to always stab them in the legs so easily. So, they definitely need their defense beefed up there. Still, the fact that they can defend themselves much better and have a back and forth riposte, parry, attack, lunge, exchange with you, at all, is a very marked improvement for this game.

I've always enjoyed Swordsman VR, but after playing through it and defeating all of the bosses, it kind of lost a lot of its luster, because by then you've mastered the game. You could defeat the enemies easily once you figured out how stupid they were. There was nothing new to any of the fights.

Enabling the Combat AI Update makes Swordsman VR a lot more fun

If Sinn Studio continues working on this and continues improving their enemy AI, then they really achieve their goal of having the best Singleplayer sword fighting experience in Virtual Reality.

This update shows a lot of potential for the direction that Sinn Studio is bringing Swordsman VR. I really hope they can bring this game continually forward to the next level. I cannot stress enough that this update is incredible. It's really given me a lot more love for the game, and it's really made me want to play through it again.

After they finish improving the AI though, it would be really great if they took another long look at the campaign and how the levels and progression are structured.

Maybe try to make the game more of an RPG than it already is. There's some great RPG elements in there already. There's already a progression system, but it feels a little boring to go through after you've already done it once. It would be really nice to see a Single Player campaign rework in Swordsman.

This could be something similar to Grimlord or Legendary Tales. That would be really nice to see built on top of the improvements that they're making to the fighting AI. If they bring it just a little bit further, it will definitively be the best single player VR sword fighting game out there.

Genotype VR Review - The First Virtual Reality Immersive Sim

Genotype VR has everything you would expect in an immersive sim game.

Massive facility to explore that is overrun with hostile creatures? Check.

Everyone is perished or worse except for one person who talks to you over the radio? Check.

For some reason, everyone who lived there used to record journals and audio logs and just leave them randomly scattered around? Check.

There are locked doors with keys you have to find, management of your limited resources, many different weapons to find... or rather grow, a little mystery as to why everything has gone so wrong, and tons of different obstacles and enemies to overcome as you scavenge and fight through this dangerous secret Antarctic Facility.

Except all of this is in Virtual Reality, and nowhere else. Built from the ground up for VR, Genotype is a pioneer of a game that is tackling an expansive and expensive genre for the first time natively to Virtual Reality headsets. It's an ambitious project to tackle for such a small studio.

While it isn't the first VR game released by developer Bolverk Games, it certainly is their most expansive. The question though, is is Genotype VR a good example of the Immersive Sim genre? Does it really succeed in being a good immersive sim game? Let's talk about it and find out more about Genotype VR in this review.

You might also be interested in:

• UNDERDOGS VR Review On The Oculus Quest 3 - A Fantastic VR Mech Fighting Game

• Grimlord Is An Awesome Dark Souls VR Game

• Propagation: Paradise Hotel Review - A Very Scary Zombie VR Game

Genotype VR Review - The Combat

Let's start with the most prevalent element in any immersive sim game, the element that all other pieces of the game revolve around, and that's the combat.

In Genotype VR you'll be fighting the aliens that have taken over the Antarctic research base that you find yourself in, and you'll be fighting a lot of them.

Fighting enemies in Genotype VR early on in the game

There will be loads of them the first time you enter an area, and even cleared out rooms can sometimes spawn more for you to take on. When aliens spawn in a room the doors will lock until you've dealt with them. There is even an in universe explanation for this. Something about an aggressive pheromone locking system that automatically closes the doors, which is a nice touch.

So you can't just run around and kite enemies through rooms forever. You'll need to stand and fight them in one location. This is a good thing because Genotype VR's combat system is very dependent on movement.

The ability to move around freely is your greatest offensive and defensive tool. This is because there are no hit scan enemies, and cover is rarely a factor. Enemies will either try to close into melee range to hit you with their claws, or more commonly shoot slow moving projectiles at you. So your ability to strafe out of the way is really important. Every fight is way easier when you have space to move around.

The game generally gives you this space, though in a few cases closes you in for a really quick and intense fight. The map design leans into how the combat works by giving you the maneuvering room that you need, but this also leads to combat that depends on you constantly strafing around enemy attacks or moving away to keep your distance.

The factor that decides whether or not you win or lose is mostly your ability to play keep away and avoid getting cornered.

You get all sorts of options in Genotype VR, like this flamethrower

Whether or not you like this movement heavy combat in your VR game is up to you, but combat in Genotype is generally enjoyable and doesn't get old. However, the constant slow strafing around projectiles does feel a little overly artificial. This is especially true during the boss encounters in this game, which are just the usual aliens but scaled up and with some smaller enemies added in.

The bosses have huge health pools and felt very bullet spongey, which is fine, they are bosses after all, but needing to constantly strafe around them while attacking made the issues with the strafe heavy combat in this game very apparent where normally the shorter length of a fight disguises it somewhat.

The game throws in new enemy types and more dangerous variants of those enemies at a pretty consistent pace. While the combat seemed a little easy at first, it does get significantly harder as you progress further into the base, though at the same time, your arsenal of tools becomes larger and more dangerous.

Your first and most obvious tools are your weapons. You start with the Spitter, a slow firing but heavy hitting weapon that does some area of effect damage. Then you soon acquire more, like the Grubber, which is a short range tentacle that can punch or grab on to enemies.

The Grubber is your weapon with infinite ammo and biomass removal tool in Genotype VR

You can deal good damage with this thing by grabbing an enemy and then ripping your hand away, which is a novel weapon for VR that has you using a different hand movement in combat than just pointing and shooting, very creative stuff.

You’ve also undoubtedly noticed that all of these weapons also aren't weapons in the traditional sense, and are rather creatures that grow out of your hand. This is a great way to explain how you can walk around with a huge arsenal, and also some cool flavor to the game overall.

A rip cord on your shooting hand lets you select which creature to grow for you to use, and not all of them are just for combat, but we'll get into exploration and utility a little later.

In Genotype VR you select a new weapon by pulling a ripcord on your main hand glove

These weapons are varied and more or less useful in different situations and enemy types. You might end up using weapons that do splash damage against swarms of smaller enemies, or a weapon that rapidly deals damage to a single enemy against big boss monsters.

There is no one weapon that is definitively more powerful than the rest, and that is a good thing. You'll naturally be inclined to use different weapons to suit different combat situations.

Now for your other combat tools, your items.

You'll find a lot of different items while scavenging the base, most importantly healing syringes, but there are more interesting ones, like rockets you can shoot out of your off hand, or syringes that make you invisible or extremely fast.

It can be difficult to use these items during combat because you'll have to constantly be moving while accessing your inventory to avoid getting hit, but they're so powerful that it's a reasonable added challenge.

All sorts of consumables are spread around the facility in Genotype VR

The one downside to items is that if you're at all stingy and hang on to them your inventory will quickly fill up.

Still, this could be intentional, because running out of inventory space directly incentivizes you to actually use these items instead of just hanging on to them forever. A little more inventory space would have been nice though.

Genotype VR Review - Exploration

So the combat is good, but what about the parts of an immersive sim that really make them an immersive sim? The world, the exploration, the atmosphere.

Well, you'll be happy to hear that there's a lot of world to explore. Each wing of the strange complex that you find yourself in is pretty big with lots of nooks and crannies to explore.

This is the usual scenery in Genotype VR. Lots of future industrial hallways

Exploration is well rewarded with more resources and tokens for upgrades, and it always feels exciting and worth it to uncover a new hallway or room. There are even a few puzzles to solve or key codes to discover and use to get tons of extra loot. The biggest downside of the exploration is that for huge chunks of the game there is very little variety.

Being outside in the antarctic winds is amazing, and the storms surrounding the facility look truly impenetrable and impressive. Unfortunately, you'll be spending most of your time indoors, and the practically identical look of the hallways, offices, maintenance rooms, and laboratories that you'll find yourself in gets old.

The outside area looks fantastic in Genotype VR, but you’ll hardly ever be there

Some areas do have this beautiful and fascinating alien growth covering them to add some variety, but you'll definitely be looking at the same sorts of industrial, sterile walls and floors a lot. Though the various tools you'll use to assist your exploring are still very cool, like the Brain Link, a creature that spawns an egg that hatches a tiny alien that you... become?

It somehow absorbs your entire body and then hatches back into a fully grown human again once you press another button. This might not make a ton of sense, but it is unique and useful for fitting into tight ventilation shafts or bridging gaps by launching the egg over them.

Even deep into the game Genotype throws some new challenges and tools your way that are completely unexpected, but welcome new challenges. Like one section that suddenly introduces a swimming mechanic. It’s these sudden new changes in exploration, puzzling, and navigation that keep Genotype fresh all the way through to the end.

Crawling through a tunnel using the Brain Link in Genotype VR

So exploration takes a little thinking as well, but hardly ever feels obtuse. Even if you do get lost there are ingame objectives and a map to help you out, but no onscreen markers.

There's also dialog between your character and the mysterious man on the other side of the radio, which will add context and character to your next goal. While their conversations are tense and mysterious at first, they quickly develop a rapport and it's fun to listen in on their conversations.

There are some light jokes, and their contributions to the story unfolding in front of your eyes and hands are pleasant and charismatic. Your mysterious helper explains the strange place you find yourself in and gives much needed context to what is going on and what you’re doing.

Genotype VR doesn't hold your hand, even with these helping nudges, but if you keep looking around and uncovering new areas you will inevitably find what you need to complete your objective.

A beautiful hallway infested by alien fauna in Genotype VR

Genotype VR - Upgrades And Personalization

What is your objective anyway? Luckily your friend over the radio has a solution to the aliens roaming the facility, and the plague that you carry within you. Did I mention you are also infected with an alien plague? Well, you are. To cure it and get rid of the creatures you will have to collect 9 DNA samples from across the facility to engineer a solution to destroy them all. So you go to each wing and collect the samples.

There's more after that of course, but I won't spoil what happens next for you here. The story of Genotype VR isn’t groundbreaking stuff, but it’s very serviceable and gives enough color to the setting through dialog and the journals scattered around the levels.

Back to the samples. They also function as upgrade points for your weapons. You can also upgrade yourself with Tokens found around the facility three times, which unlocks some more general buffs and a maximum health increase. This is where the Immersive Sim nature of Genotype VR shines again, and why that's such a focus of this review.

Upgrading a weapon at an upgrade terminal in Genotype VR

What's an immersive sim without the ability to choose how you want to approach each situation? Well Genotype VR doesn't give you an insane amount of customizeability, but enough to make you feel like you're choosing upgrades that fit your playstyle. Each weapon has a few to choose from, and even just choosing which weapons to upgrade is a choice within itself.

Since I was so attached to the Grubber I decided to upgrade it first with a health leeching ability that also increased its damage. Oh, and the swarmer too with a faster fire rate.

While there are situations in which each weapon you can grow from your hand is useful, there are also many chances to pick favorites. You also get some more general upgrade choices each time you collect enough of the Tokens spread around the base. Like a passive ability that makes each alien you destroy explode into a ball of lightning to hit its allies.

Choosing an upgrade in Genotype VR

If you're ever unhappy with your decisions or want to try a new playstyle you can redo all of your upgrade choices at any time. The freedom to mix and match your choices at will is good to have, and changing up which weapons you will favor and how you use them is a real mark of an Immersive Sim VR game.

Crafting and resource management are also typical hallmarks of the Immersive SIm genre. There's a crafting resource you can collect by defeating enemies or finding capsules of the stuff lying around.

I found that I had an absolute ton of it pretty early on in the game and never ran anywhere close to empty, so strict resource management wasn't much of an issue. Though the Grubber has infinite ammo in case you run out completely, it would be pretty difficult to run out of resources, and this one resource can print basically anything you need at an upgrade station.

Healing items, buff items, rockets you can shoot from your off hand, and ammo of course. While Genotype VR doesn't utilize resource scarcity to ratchet up the tension, the abundance of resources also gives you a lot of latitude and options to pick your playstyle by choosing which items to create and carry in your inventory.

The inventory in Genotype VR

Overall Genotype VR has turned out to be a fantastic VR game. I enjoyed it all the way through to the end. If you love immersive sims then you should definitely give this game a try.

In fact, if you're dying for a new and novel singleplayer VR game then Genotype VR is a good choice for any VR gamer who has liked what they've heard in this Genotype VR review. It's a game that makes you want to just explore one more room to see what is next until the next thing you know, your headset is out of battery.

So Genotype VR is a fun game that I’d recommend, but is it truly the first VR Immersive Sim?

I’d say so, your vast choices of items to use and upgrades to take can change how you approach enemy encounters. Though you’ll have to do a lot of strafing regardless of what you pick. Your options mostly come down to weapon selection, and different weapons do play differently. Genotype VR reminded me a lot of the remake of the original System Shock in its pacing and exploration.

This feeling was more deeply ingrained by other elements like the audio logs, text logs, and lock boxes that lead back to the start of the genre.

Genre definitions are more up to the community than individual reviewers such as myself, so whether or not Genotype VR counts as the first VR immersive sim is up to you, but if you ask me I’d say it does.

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