Spatial Ops' single-player mode delivers a thrilling new spin on mixed reality shooters
Spatial Ops is out today for Meta Quest and Pico. We had a lot of fun playing through the single-player campaign. Read on for our hands-on impressions.
Spatial Ops is the latest game from Resolution Games, which has enjoyed success in a variety of genres with titles such as Demeo, Blaston and Racket Club.
Designed from the ground up for mixed reality, Spatial Ops features two distinctive game modes:
- Designed for local multiplayer with up to eight players, the Arena mode turns your home, gym, or outdoor space into a mixed reality arena where you can engage in fierce gun battles. Supported game modes are Free for All, Team Deathmatch, Capture the Flag and Domination. Maps are automatically generated, but can also be customized using a map editor.
- The two-hour single-player campaign uses a futuristic portal generator to race you through seven action-packed shooter levels and pitting you against a corrupt organization.
For this article, I played through the single-player campaign. Here are my impressions.
Move and shoot with portals
If you think the campaign is just an add-on to the arena mode, think again. The single-player adventure is its own, polished, narrative game with an ingenious twist on mixed reality.
You are a special unit of the Spatial Ops fighting against the corrupt Hatchet Corporation. While still in physical reality, you enter a cube-shaped portal generator that opens portals into your area of operation on all four sides and even above your head, through which you take out enemies with a growing arsenal of weapons.
As if that weren't enough, your portal room is also mobile and will move through enemy territory on its own. You will have to be on your toes to keep track of which side portals are opening into enemy territory.
What is essentially a straightforward light gun shooter takes on a thrilling new dimension thanks to the mixed reality component. As bullets whiz from digital to physical reality, enemies enter your room, and downed drones fall on your floor, you truly feel like a badass special forces unit equipped with futuristic technology.
Short but intense fun
As you progress through the game's seven missions, you will collect crystals to unlock additional weapon slots, new weapons, and other equipment. There are power-ups in the levels themselves that you can use to temporarily increase your damage, slow time, and perform other cool effects.
The single-player campaign also tells a story, but I found it difficult to follow due to the non-stop action. I finished after about two hours and will now try the higher difficulty.
If you want to play the Arena mode as well, make sure you have enough room and friends with their own Meta Quest. This mode can only be played in the same location, there is no online play mode.
Spatial Ops is available today in the Horizon Store for Meta Quest 3, 3S, 2 and Pro, and in a "Campaign Edition" in the Pico Store for Pico 4 headsets, which contains only the single-player campaign.
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