Wipeout HD: Fury completely overhauls what was already an excellent game. The new modes will entice both newcomers and seasoned veterans by shifting the game’s focus slightly and making the experience much more varied. Couple that with an entirely new single player campaign, 8 new tracks and the extended community features that Studio Liverpool have been patching in over the past few months and you have one of the most complete DLC packs of the year.
Wipeout HD was a massive success when it launched last year, achieving unparalleled reviews across the board from a host of outlets. The Fury expansion pack extends on that with 8 new tracks, 13 new ship models and 3 new game modes. The substantial game changes that the DLC provides are evident from the moment you install the package; gone is the clean white and blue interface and in its place is a glitched black and red dystopia; it’s all a metaphor for what Wipeout HD: Fury is about — gone are the clean races and perfect laps; this is carnage baby.
The three new modes offer a unique twist on the classic Wipeout HD gameplay. With the emphasis on perfect racing lines gone, Fury is likely to entice those who found the learning curve of the original game too steep. New mode Eliminator is all about attacking your opponents and getting points for your efforts. Destroying rival ships will score you bonus points where completing laps will give you much needed health boosts. Here the gameplay is not so much about getting round the track, more finishing at the top of a leaderboard by inflicting as much damage as possible. In this sense it plays very much like a futuristic Destruction Derby, a comparison only emphasised by the inclusion of simple 180 degree turns at the tap of the L1 button. It’s an interesting mechanic which can be deadly when used in the right way. For example, imagine you are the leader of the pack with the Shockwave weapon in your arsenal. What would have been useless in this situation now becomes massively effective. By simply hitting the L1 button you’ll be able to flip your ship around, fire the Shockwave at the pack of ships behind you and quickly flip back around to maintain your position out of sight. A simple maneuver but a potentially game winning one. The excitement is only compounded by playing online where Studio Liverpool’s new badge system and ranking emphasise the competitive nature.
The second game mode - Detonator - elaborates Studio Liverpool’s shift from the perfect racing line. In fact, with the implementation of this new mode Wipeout HD should no longer be considered as just a racing game; for Detonator is clearly inspired by the Shoot ‘Em Up genre. At its core playing like the standard Zones mode, Detonator has a massive twist. I.e. you not only have to keep your ship from exploding, but you also have to deal with the mines on the track. Thankfully, your team’s new Detonator ship is attached with a futuristic machine gun and shockwave weapon. Pressing Square fires your weapon, where hitting multiple mines with the same round introduces a multiplier scoring system. Thanks to the clever implementation of a reload mechanic, you can’t just simply hold the Square button all the time, you’ll need to time your bursts of machine gun power and also your reloads (with the Circle button). That’s not all though. Hitting the pads on the floor charge up your shockwave weapon. Unleashing this at the right time can be paramount for getting out of a tricky spot or maximising your score. Like the traditional Zones mode, each lap increases the ships speed and the number of mines. It’s not easy but it’s excellent fun and a welcome twist to the Wipeout HD formula. The entirety of the Fury DLC pack could have just consisted of this mode and we’d still be delighted.
Thankfully there is one more mode to speak of - Zone Battle. Despite being the weaker of the three modes, Zone Battle is still an interesting competitive twist on the classic Zones gameplay. Pitting you against seven other players on a Zones track, Zone Battle is a race to the target Zone. As those who have played any Wipeout game will know, Zones gets harder as the game ramps up the speed. This is apparent in Zone Battle. By hitting pads, your ship’s speed is boosted, but your “Zone Bar” is also increased. The Zone bars energy can be unleashed in two different ways - for recovering valuable ship life or boosting forward a few Zones. The emphasis on risk and reward gameplay is particularly clever but we couldn’t help but feel Zone Battle felt a bit unbalanced.
While all these new modes are perfectly retroactive with the game’s current tracks, there are also eight entirely new courses to speak of. They all complement the game’s futuristic aesthetic and feel great. One level takes you through a futuristic journey of a canyon. Achieving high scores on all the courses will require a massive time investment welcomed by fans of the game.
Likewise there is an entirely new campaign with another 80 Gold badges to earn. This alone could take up to 20 hours to complete so we hope we’re really emphasising how much content is available in Wipeout HD Fury.
Couple that with the new community features and an indepth statistics mode which tells you pretty much everything you could ever want to know about what type of Wipeout HD player you are and you have the perfect piece of DLC. If you’re yet to jump into the game, or have been waiting for a reason to return, Fury is it.
Log in to comment