Light Tracer PlayStation VR Review

Light Tracer is a VR platformer that works very well as a VR game, once again showing that such a genre is very possible in VR. The more genres in VR that work, the better in my book, as this means that there will be more varied games available to play through this wondrous new perspective of playing games.

Light Tracer has you directing a cartoon princess up a tower, which basically means that the game is another fly-on-the-wall VR experience. You direct the pint sized princess by way of a staff, and by simply holding a button down and moving the Move controller in the desired direction, she follows the light beam that it emits. Even though you aren’t exactly controlling the princess, it feels like you are, and you even instruct her when to jump and attack (when you eventually receive a sword), and things like that.

As the game makes use of two Move controllers, the other controller poses as a second hand and allows you to alter the camera angle as well as to interact with the environment in various ways, although camera angles aren’t always ideal, even if said camera is adjustable. With its narrow platforms, the game can also take a little getting used to, but the controls soon start making a lot of sense, and Light Tracer can therefore definitely be called very well designed.

The level layout as well as the traps become increasingly more challenging as you climb the tower. You’ll be faced with moving platforms, objects which you have to manually move with your hand, slippy ice, complex contraptions, and more. It’s definitely a game that feels satisfying to play, particularly if you are able to get to the end of a rather tricky section.

Light Tracer also has bosses at the end of each chapter, although these are sadly often more of an annoyance as opposed to anything else. The game doesn’t give you any feedback as to how you are faring against these bosses, and each time you fail, their invisible health bars are reset. The game would have been perfectly fine without these boss encounters, but at least they give you something a little bit different to deal with.

Light Tracer has a rather pleasant soundtrack, although it does start feeling a little repetitive from time to time. Speaking of repetitive, what’s even worse is that each and every time you fail the princess will keep saying the same things over and over again, which can become insanely repetitive during the game’s trickier sections.

In spite of a number of rather damaging flaws, which includes dodgy bosses and a bit of a finicky camera, Light Tracer is a largely impressive game, and is a good example as to how to make something like a platformer work in VR. While the game may take a little while to completely get to grips with, the controls and level design are still very well thought out in a lot of ways, and it’s also a platformer with lots of charm.