Super Stardust HD on initial impressions seems to be the PSN response to Geometry Wars, the extremely successful Xbox Live title, that's all well and good but the real question is to ascertain if it's worth your hard earned Yen, Pounds or dollhairs.
Lacking an amiga I never got around to playing super stardust in its entirety and completely missing the original game the only opportunity to play this was for around 10 minutes oh so many years ago and in all honesty I really don't remember much.
In it's new incarnation the game has a slick interface, custom soundtrack, can list trophies as being the first game to support them and also can claim to have multiple expansion packs.
Sounds good right? Well, it's as hardcore a game as you could get right now. The online leaderboards show amazing scores you'd be unlikely to get within a thousandth of in your first day of play, you'll be swamped by asteroids and find it hard to escape without the incoming sound of enemies to be let loose.
As a top down shooter the game draws a lot of comparissons with the XBox title Geometry Wars and despite being a retro remake it obviously borrows a huge amount of design structure from the widely successful XBox game.
It is blatantly obvious that should you own an XBox and Geometry Wars you'd be hard pressed to find a reason to purchase this game but for the PS3 owners out there you're likely to find the closest experience to Geometry Wars with this game.
As another relatively cheap game on the PSN store you'd want to know just how far the game goes to make retail games look bad. Unfortunately it's not far, the game is extremely repetitive with very little difference between levels and an obvious lack of variety in enemies and asteroids (though there are 3 different types in gameplay mechanics).
The weapon selection and upgrading in the game is quite a merit to strive for with my personal favourite being the gold melter but all will be required throughout the game in order to efficiently dispose of the asteroids rapidly raining down on the planet.
Co-op mode is available for those interested in the multiplayer aspect but apart from the online leaderboards there's little online action to be had. The difficulty level should rarely be switched above normal unless you like to inflict pain upon yourself considering how cramped you can feel during the game and with only the boost and the sparse availability of bombs you'll be on a weathered flight.
The games difficulty really helps the longetivity of the game but it's execution has you wishing the variety of enemies improved could've helped the game immensely.
If you'd like a hard as nails arcade experience there is literally nothing else to buy expect this but for the average gamer I'd say there's not a great amount of gameplay out there unless you're looking for a promotion and leaderboard glory.
Good luck with the trophies!!
Verdict:Good
