Remember Asteroids, that old vector arcade game in which you use a triangular spaceship to shoot down asteroids and flying saucers in space? Sure, it was a bit on the simple side, but it kept people entertained. Now, imagine playing Asteroids while on LSD. The result would probably be rather similar to Beat Hazard, an indie arcade game for Xbox LIVE Indie Games and Steam. Developed by UK developers Steve and Norman Hunt and released in October 2009 for Xbox LIVE and April 2010 for Steam, Beat Hazard takes the gameplay from Asteroids and turns it up to eleven for an intense and visually heavy experience that makes use of the player’s music collection. For more, jump past the break.
While it isn’t a lengthy, complicated game, Beat Hazard is a lot of fun, and the idea of being able to use your own music library is an interesting prospect. While it isn’t the first game to do such a thing (with games such as Audiosurf having been available for some time), it doesn’t take away from what makes Beat Hazard fun. If there is one flaw that Beat Hazard has, however, it is the shooting system. The PC version utilizes the mouse to aim and fire, which is fine. However, the problem lies with the Xbox version, which assigns aiming and firing to the right analog stick. It works just fine for the most part, but it can get a bit annoying from time to time.
Offering four differing levels of difficulty, the gameplay in Beat Hazard is as vast as the player’s music collection, with each audio track providing a different experience. Again, the game is similar to Asteroids, in which you steer a ship among a two-dimensional plane, shooting down asteroids and enemy ships. However, the gameplay in Beat Hazard uniquely alters this aspect, utilizing the chosen music track as the weapon itself. The more intense the music gets, the more effective your weapon becomes. This forces players to be cautious about their choices of songs, as songs with slow and silent moments will leave the players vulnerable and without a way to defend themselves. However, the players have another weapon at their disposal: the super bomb, which wipes out any enemy onscreen. Additionally, players can also acquire power-ups. These power-ups come in three kinds: +1s, which add to your score multiplier; VOLs, which increase the music’s volume and increase your weapons visual intensity and power; and POWs, which add an additional stream of fire to your weapons. Filling up both the VOL and POW meters fully enables the eponymous Beat Hazard weapon, the most powerful weapon the players have at their disposals.
Overall, Beat Hazard is a fun, colorful game to play. The visuals are intense, however, so if you have sensitive eyes, you may want to skip it. As you power up, the visuals only get more vivid, which gets even worse (or better, depending on whom you ask) as you increase the difficulty. There is also an incentive for achieving high scores, which increases your rank and grants you starting bonuses like an increased starting multiplier, as well as VOL and POW power-ups at the beginning of a stage. The game is available on Xbox LIVE Indie Games for 400 MPS and on Steam for $9.99.
Beat Hazard was reviewed on the Xbox 360. Review code courtesy of Microsoft.