Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9 out of 10

Ultratron is a retro arcade twin-stick shooter game available for download from the PlayStation Store for the PS4, PS3 and PS Vita. The game is a spiritual successor to Robotron 2084 and is certainly inspired by the games from the era of the classic retro arcade shooters of the 1980s.

The story revolves around the last human in the universe being killed by evil killer robots with nothing but bad intentions and must be stopped, although the only thing standing in the way of their plans for universal domination is the last remaining humanoid droid.

Players can earn in-game currency by destroying droids and collecting the dots they leave behind which range for example from $10 for destroying smaller enemies, $25 for slightly bigger enemies and $100 for larger faster enemies which accumulates spending money which players can spend at the Omnicorp Shop-O-Matic store which provides a huge range of upgrades.

There are only two upgrades which are initially available to choose from in the form of shields and smartbombs, although they are both at the lowest level of performance, while there are a further 18 upgrades which are progressively unlockable as the player reaches new levels. There are some interesting upgrades such as Droid Power which increases the strength of the player’s primary weapon, Auto Smarts which automatically fires smartbombs when the droid has no shields remaining and is about to receive damage from an enemy, Shooty Pet provides an A.I. controlled pet droid armed with a blaster and the ability to increase targeting speed and rate of fire upon upgrading, Pets Level Up providing increased firepower for pets after they have destroyed a certain amount of enemies and Quantum Shift produces a speed boost straight through enemies or bullets without harm.

There are some further important gameplay mechanics such as a checkpoint system in which progression is saved after completing 10 levels on the 11th, 21st and 31st levels, while destroying Spideroids by shooting them produces power-ups, alongside collecting any power-ups that appear is also essential, although some power-ups may be better off being shot at as some power-ups react when shot and collecting fruit to earn a points bonus with a points multiplier on offer for progressing through levels by performing to the best of your ability.

 

The environment design is arena based with over 40 levels, alongside challenge stages and dodge stages in which players have to shoot all of the fast moving Spideroids and avoid enemies respectively, therefore the variation in design comes mostly from the enemy design which comprises of smaller enemies that become larger, faster and more aggressive as players progress further and 4 larger enemy bosses who are also known as the 4 giant boss bots of the apocalypse.

Ultratron supports cross-buy and cross-save between the PS4, PS3 and Vita. Cross-buy presents a superb amount of value as it means that players will be purchasing the PS4, PS3 and Vita versions of the game with just a single purchase. The cross-save functionality allows the syncing of progression of the save file from the Vita to the PS3 or PS4 and vice versa, so players can start playing the game on their Vita on the way to and from work, sync the save game when they return home and then resume where they left off by loading the save game and continuing via the PS3 or PS4 version. The cross-save feature is made possible by uploading the save file to the cloud on one console and downloading it from the other console.

The controls are well mapped to the DualShock 4 controller with the control scheme consisting of changing the direction of the left analogue stick to move, changing the direction of the right analogue stick to shoot, pressing L1, L2 or R2 to fire a smartbomb, pressing R1 to activate a speed boost, pressing the share button takes players to the share feature menu and pressing the options button to display the pause menu. Tapping the touch pad is an alternative method of firing a smartbomb, while the light bar changes colour periodically as it remains a specific colour for the duration of a set of levels such as red in the earlier levels and a light yellow in the immediate following levels as well as flashing a bright white colour in accordance with the flashing of the title logo on the main menu, alongside the DualShock 4 controller vibrating when the character walks into or is hit by an enemy.

Graphically, Ultratron is stylistically pretty good as it provides a visual charm which it certainly channels from its own retro inspirations such as Robotron 2084 in the same sense that any retro game would be anticipated to have a retro charm to it, while the environments glow with neon and the enemies come in a variety of shapes and sizes with the weapons and explosions looking colourful and as a retro influenced game would be anticipated to project such subject matter.

The presentation of the game is solid with a great user interface across various menus such as the main, help, options, online leaderboards and various gameplay menus with support for navigation via the left analogue stick, directional pad and face buttons, although it does not include support for navigation via the right analogue stick and touch pad. The background of the main menu consists of a mass of droids looking in different directions as the title logo of the game flickers in strobe lighting in the foreground, while lighting flashes from darkness to bright.

The audio is as inspired by retro gaming as the graphics with a futuristic robotic voice-over which informs the player of the multiplier status and when enemy waves have been detected, while the sound effects include shooting enemies, enemies shooting back and explosions and alongside retro infused Sci-Fi arcade music. There is no DualShock 4 speaker implementation on the PS4 version which could have produced such sound effects as the voice-over, enemies firing at the character, the character firing back at enemies, explosions or the retro soundtrack.

 

The trophy list includes 12 trophies with 7 bronze, 4 silver and 1 gold trophy. The easier trophies include the Ieiunitas bronze trophy for defeating the first enemy boss Ieiunitas at the end of level 10 which is easier than the other enemy bosses as its patterns of movement are more predictable, the Healthy Diet bronze trophy for consuming 10 consecutive fruits and the Supervisory Position silver trophy for beating a level without firing a single shot which is easier than it sounds as a pet droid purchased from the upgrades store can fire their blaster at enemies as the player patiently manoeuvres around them.

The hardest trophies have to be the Crufts silver trophy for not allowing any pets to take damage for 10 consecutive levels with a pet droid receiving the slightest of hits from an enemy resulting in having to start the 10 level streak again, although quitting the level then continuing it will remove the hit on the pet droid as though it never happened and the Letum gold trophy for defeating the fourth and final enemy boss Letum at the end of level 40. It is estimated that depending upon skill and a good trophy guide to provide some helpful tips that it would take between 2 to 3 hours to 100% the trophy list.

There are no difficulty levels, although the difficulty curve is adaptive to the skill level of the player resulting in the difficulty of the game shaping itself to how well the player is performing with an excellent flawless performance producing a harder difficulty curve with more enemies who are quicker and far more aggressive in their attacks, while a player who performs poorly receives a much easier difficulty curve with less enemies moving slowly and far less aggression in their attacks.

Local multiplayer comprises of a two player drop-in/drop-out co-operative experience on the same screen which performs just as wonderfully as the single player in which both players are attempting to fight off hordes of enemies together and can revive the other player within a specific time limit when the player has taken too much damage to continue surviving and battling through the level on PS4 or PS3, although there is no cross-play multiplayer between the Vita and either of the home consoles which is somewhat of a missed opportunity as is the lack of online multiplayer which could have reflected the local co-operative multiplayer experience.

The online leaderboards focuses on global and friends scores covering the single player and co-operative multiplayer scores separately with each leaderboard containing each player’s rank; name (PSN ID) and their overall highest score with the positioning of each player based upon how high their best score is, although perhaps the fastest times would have been a worthy addition and alternative in regards to the positioning of the leaderboards, while an online leaderboard for every individual level would have been a further improvement.

The replayability of Ultratron is provided primarily by progressing further with a better performance and a higher multiplier in order to successfully post a higher score to the online leaderboards than previously thought possible when first having played the game and struggled through difficulty adapted levels only to hone skills enough to enhance the score with every attempt, while upgrading plays a major part in progression across the over 40 levels, challenge and dodge stages, numerous hordes of enemies and 4 enemy bosses in single player or local co-operative multiplayer which will collectively have players returning for quite some time.

 

Overall, Ultratron is faithful to its retro gaming influences such as Robotron 2084 and is just as charming, therefore if you are a fan of retro arcade gaming you will find Ultratron to be an exceptional game which will bring back fond memories of the retro arcade gaming experiences of the past, although the game has capabilities far beyond that of nostalgia and is a must purchase, especially for an enjoyable triple cross-buy release on PS4, PS3 and Vita for just £7.99*!

Jason Bonnar

Analysis

• Title: Ultratron
• Developer: Curve Studios (PS4, PS3 and PS Vita)/Puppy Games (Original Developer)
• Publisher: Curve Studios
• System: PS4, PS3 and PS Vita
• Format: PSN Download
• Cross-Buy: Yes (PS4, PS3 and PS Vita)
• Cross-Play: Yes (Cross-Save)
• Players: 1-2 (Local Multiplayer)/Online Leaderboards
• Hard Drive Space Required: 193.7MB
• * Correct at time of publication