Category: Vertical Robot

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Sci-fi Puzzle Sequel Red Matter 2 is a Meta Quest 2 Exclusive

Today’s Meta Quest Gaming Showcase has been filled with surprises and none more so than Vertical Robot’s unveiling of Red Matter 2. The original Red Matter came to PC VR headsets in 2018, offering an engrossing mix of puzzles and a creepy sci-fi atmosphere. Vertical Robot will expand upon this premise whilst bringing the title to Meta Quest 2 exclusively.

Red Matter 2

Red Matter 2 will be a direct sequel so if you haven’t played the original and don’t want any story spoilers look away now: “After breaking free from the simulation that held your own mind hostage, your first priority is to escape the AtlanticUnion’s base. However, you unexpectedly discover a distress signal belonging to an old friend. Determined to come to his rescue, you will travel to the farthest reaches of the solar system to find him,” the new synopsis explains.

Whilst the first game was all about building an intense atmosphere with an almost horror-like element but without any scares, Red Matter 2 will be dropping in some action. New mechanics like the jet pack will see you traversing environmental puzzles whilst the controller designed tool can turn into a weapon to shoot enemies.

Talking about some of the features that have gone into Red Matter 2, Vertical Robot’s Norman Schaar said in a statement: “We just can’t wait for players to feast their eyes on the incredible graphics that we’ve succeeded in creating, thanks to our tremendous efforts in optimizing for Meta Quest 2. We believe immersion is key, and have therefore developed a fully ‘physicalized’ world to maximize this sense of immersion, while also enabling us to create exciting new gameplay possibilities around it.”

Red Matter 2

What’s great to hear is that Red Matter 2 is going to be bigger and feature more content than its predecessor. Because that was one of the main issues in the original, there just wasn’t enough of it with gmw3’s four-star review of Red Matter saying: “All in all, Red Matter is a very high calibre VR experience, neatly weaving its story and puzzle elements together. It is by no means perfect, following the line of other puzzles in VR that are seemingly unable to offer plenty of reasons to come back for more. So like a good meal take it slowly and savour the moment.”

Red Matter 2 is currently slated for a Summer 2022 launch on Meta Quest 2, so as further details are announced gmw3 will get back to you.

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‘Red Matter 2’ Announced for Quest 2, Promising to Deliver the “best graphics on mobile VR to date”

Today during the Meta Quest Gaming Showcase, developer Vertical Robot announced Red Matter 2 for Quest 2, the sequel to its 2018 PC VR game which was eventually ported to Quest. Not only does the studio say the gameplay is expanding further into the adventure genre over just puzzling, but it also claims it will deliver the “best graphics on mobile VR to date.”

The original Red Matter launched back in 2018 on PC VR where it found a very positive reception but remained largely in the cult-favorite category. When developer Vertical Robot eventually ported the game to the original Quest in 2019, it stood out as one of the best looking titles on the headset thanks to the care the studio took in optimizing the game to run on Quest’s diminutive hardware.

This time around the studio seems to be building Red Matter 2 from the ground up for the even more powerful Quest 2 (and won’t have the overhead of trying to cram a game originally made for PC VR onto standalone VR hardware).

To that end the studio is throwing down the gauntlet, saying it plans to deliver the “best graphics on mobile VR to date.” And while the game’s announcement trailer (below) is probably captured on PC, assuming the studio has made a good-faith effort to show what Red Matter 2 will really look like on Quest 2… well, consider us impressed.

But Red Matter 2 promises to be more than just pretty graphics. While the original was largely a narrative-puzzle game, the studio says the sequel has “expanded the gameplay into the adventure genre.”

“[Vertical Robot] have crafted a rich narrative-driven adventure with excellent voice-over work and new gameplay mechanics. Not only will you face brand new and challenging puzzles, but thanks to a new jetpack you will be able to traverse the game’s incredible environments more freely than ever before through platforming sections,” the studio says. “A new tool has been added to the classic loadout that will enable you to hack terminals, as well as a (projectile) weapon that will prove useful in various environmental puzzles as well as in combat. Yes! Red Matter 2 features some action as well.”

Beyond that, the studio says Red Matter 2 will include a heavy emphasis on physics objects.

“We believe immersion is key, and have therefore developed a fully ‘physicalized’ world to maximize this sense of immersion, while also enabling us to create exciting new gameplay possibilities around it,” says Vertical Robot co-Founder and Technical Artist Norman Schaar.

'Red Matter 2' Screenshots
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Image courtesy Vertical Robot
Image courtesy Vertical Robot
Image courtesy Vertical Robot
Image courtesy Vertical Robot
Image courtesy Vertical Robot

Red Matter 2 is planned to launch on Quest 2, though it’s not clear if the game will also find its way to the original Quest or PC VR as the original game did (though we’ve reached out for more info). There’s no specific release date yet for Red Matter 2, but Meta has said that all the games announced during the Quest Gaming Showcase would be out ‘within the next year’ (though we’re not clear if that means in 2022 or ‘in the next 12 months). We’ve reached out for clarification.

The post ‘Red Matter 2’ Announced for Quest 2, Promising to Deliver the “best graphics on mobile VR to date” appeared first on Road to VR.

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Down the Rabbit Hole Adds 90Hz Support on Oculus Quest 2

Down The Rabbit Hole

Cortopia Studios’ puzzle title Down the Rabbit Hole has made quite the impression since its launch last year, garnering positive reviews and award nominations. Today, the developer has announced support is now available for Oculus Quest 2’s 90Hz mode as well as a new bundle with Red Matter.

Down The Rabbit Hole

Down the Rabbit Hole joins a growing lineup of videogames previously released for Oculus Quest that are making use of Oculus Quest 2’s extra capabilities. Some have had general visual improvements whilst others like Beat Saber have made use of the headset’s 90Hz mode for smoother gameplay. Whether you’re new to Down the Rabbit Hole or have previously completed it, either way, you’ll get an improved visual experience.

Down the Rabbit Hole launched almost a year ago, offering a twist to the classic Alice in Wonderland tale created by Lewis Carroll. This puzzle-driven adventure is set before Alice ever makes it to the magical realm, with an unnamed girl stumbling across Wonderland in search of her lost pet patches.

The videogame is set out like you’re in that rabbit hole leading down to Wonderland, with all the action taking place within its walls as small dioramas. Controlling the girl through the various scenes, each with its own puzzle, you can move the world by grabbing tree roots growing out the walls to get a better view. In some instances you’ll be transported inside the scene for a closer look.

As mentioned, alongside the update for a limited time you can by Down the Rabbit Hole and sci-fi puzzle title Red Matter in a dual bundle on the Oculus Store for $14.99 USD. The offer will be running for one week only.

Vertical Robot’s Red Matter is a suspense-laden puzzler set in an alternate future where you play a secret agent sent to an enemy’s abandoned base on Rhea, one of Saturn’s moons, to recover information. Originally released back in 2018, VRFocus found Red Matter to be: “a very high calibre VR experience, neatly weaving its story and puzzle elements together.” 

VRFocus will continue its coverage of the latest Oculus Quest 2 enhancements, reporting back with further updates.

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Sci-fi Adventure ‘Red Matter’ Coming to Oculus Quest in August

Red Matter (2018), the sci-fi puzzle-adventure from Vertical Robot, is slated to launch on Oculus Quest on August 15th.

Set in fictional universe featuring two old Cold War rivalries—the NATO-esque Atlantic Union and the very Soviet-sounding Volgravians—Red Matter puts you in the space boots of Agent Epsilon, an Atlantic Union astronaut. Traveling to an abandoned  Volgravian base on one of Saturn’s moons to investigate a top secret Volgravian research project, you unravel a tale that’s much larger than your handlers led you to believe.

As a sort of retrofuture adventure, it makes for a fun mix of 70s and 80s era tech, like old CRT monitors and analogue switchboards, and places a patently Soviet style of brutalist architecture into the far reaches of the Solar System, answering the question: What if the Space Race never stopped?

While Vertical Robot was able to squeeze in some pretty impressive visuals into the PC VR version (developed in Unreal Engine), the Quest version of the game promises to retain fair degree of the original’s visual finesse, something the studio says was done by using a modified version of Unreal’s mobile VR shaders.

Some of the mobile-specific optimizations (detailed in the video below) include parallax corrected reflections, multiple lightpoints, improved glass, raytraced line reflections, improved fog & sun reflections, and glass refraction.

In the meantime, check out why we gave Red Matter a solid [8.3/10] in our full review when it launched on Rift last year. The game has since been released on Steam with support for Rift, Vive, Index and Windows VR headsets.

The post Sci-fi Adventure ‘Red Matter’ Coming to Oculus Quest in August appeared first on Road to VR.

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Ace Sci-Fi Adventure, Red Matter, Coming To Quest With Improved Visuals

Red Matter, one of VR’s best adventure games, is heading to Oculus Quest very soon.

Developer Vertical Robot just confirmed that its hugely enjoyable puzzle game lands on the standalone headset on August 15. That’s the same day as Pinball FX2 VR and Time Stall. A busy day for Quest fans, then.

That said, you should definitely check out Red Matter if you haven’t already. In the game, you play as an agent in a sci-fi Cold War, traveling to the barren planet of Rhea to investigate an abandoned base. Soon after you arrive you start experiencing strange hallucinations. It’s not long before you discover that not all is what it seems.

In the video above Vertical Robot details some of the changes its made to the game’s visuals for Quest. Surprisingly, the team’s actually added to the graphical feature set, resulting in a game that looks incredibly polished on the standalone headset.

We really liked the game when we played it on PSVR last year. Its puzzles strike a welcome balance between challenge and pacing and its story keeps you hooked.

“Red Matter is nothing short of a textbook example of how to do VR adventure games right,” we wrote. “It emphasizes design and experience, putting immersion front and center, making a bullet-proof case for why it needs to be seen and played in VR. Short length and some troublesome puzzles betray its winning streak to some degree, but don’t change the fact that this is one sci-fi story you shouldn’t miss out on.”

We’ve reached out to Vertical Robot to ask after features like cross-buy support.

The post Ace Sci-Fi Adventure, Red Matter, Coming To Quest With Improved Visuals appeared first on UploadVR.

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Retrofuture Cold War Adventure ‘Red Matter’ Heading to PSVR This Month

Red Matter (2018), the retrofuturistic first-person adventure game previously launched on PC VR headsets, is headed to PSVR this month in North America and Europe.

Vertical Robot released word of the PSVR launch in a tweet, saying the single-player adventure game is headed to the PlayStation store starting December 6th in Europe, and December 11 in North America.

The version optimized for PlayStation Pro features what Vertical Robot say is a “20% pixel density increase as well as much improved anti aliasing.”

Image courtesy Vertical Robot

Red Matter launched first on the Oculus Store for Rift in May, and later on Steam for Vive, Rift, and Windows VR headsets in November.

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If you don’t have time to read our review and see why we gave it a solid [8.3/10] for PC VR, here’s a quick summary of what awaits you:

Red Matter tosses you into a strange and mysterious alternate universe which takes old Cold War rivalries and teases them out to an interesting logical conclusion: space bases, astronaut espionage and a healthy dose of intrigue as you, a member of the Atlantic Union, infiltrate the off-planet test facility of the very Soviet-sounding Volgravians.

Image courtesy Vertical Robot

Like most adventure games, Red Matter’s emphasis is on telling its story through found items such as notes, diaries, photos, and a host of everyday objects.

It just so happens that when you crash-land on the Volgravian base on Rhea, a moon of Saturn, that two-way communication is disrupted—but you still have your handy Volgravian-to-English translating module, making it a constant exercise in deciphering the faux-Russian script.

The post Retrofuture Cold War Adventure ‘Red Matter’ Heading to PSVR This Month appeared first on Road to VR.

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Awesome Sci-Fi Puzzle Adventure Red Matter Confirmed for PlayStation VR

After launching its debut title Daedalus, a surreal puzzle experience for Samsung Gear VR in 2017, Spanish developer Vertical Robot followed that up with a much grander adventure Red Matter for Oculus Rift earlier this year. Now, the studio has revealed it’ll be porting the title to PlayStation VR this week.

Making the announcement via it’s Twitter account Vertical Robot has confirmed that Red Matter will come to European PlayStation VR customers this Thursday, 6th December. A North American release is also on the cards but a specific date hasn’t been set just yet.

Red Matter is a narrative-driven puzzle experience set in an alternate future where an ongoing cold war ensues between two superpowers: the Atlantic Union and the People’s Republic of Volgravia. You play Agent Epsilon, an astronaut from the Atlantic Union dispatched to an abandoned base on Rhea, one of Saturn’s moons. Your mission is to recover top-secret information concerning research carried out by members of the People’s Republic of Volgravia.

While the videogame isn’t a full-blown horror experience it keeps the atmosphere tense and foreboding with you being the only person wandering around the base. Keeping with Vertical Robot’s penchant for the unusual, Red Matter dables in surreal and weird moments as you complete puzzles and unlock more of the story.

In VRFocus’ four-star review of Red Matter we found that: “All in all, Red Matter is a very high calibre VR experience, neatly weaving its story and puzzle elements together. It by no means perfect, following the line of other puzzles in VR that are seemingly unable to offer plenty of reasons to come back for more. So like a good meal take it slowly and savour the moment.”

With the PlayStation VR version only a few days away from launch, last month Vertical Robot expanded PC support to HTC VIve and Windows Mixed Reality headsets, making the title available through Steam. For any further updates on Red Matter, keep reading VRFocus.

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Review: Red Matter

Having previewed Red Matter last week, VRFocus instantly liked Vertical Robot’s virtual reality (VR) follow-up to Daedalus. Continuing with the puzzle genre, Red Matter takes you on a sci-fi adventure that features an engrossing story, moments that terrify and just enough complexity to get you stuck – just not for too long.

As you should be aware by now from VRFocus’ previous coverage, Red Matter is set on one of Saturn’s moons. You’re a secret agent sent from an Earth at war between two factions, the Atlantic Union and the People’s Republic of Volgravia. As an agent of the former you’ve been tasked with locating secret documents from Volgravia’s base on the moon of Rhea.

Straight from the off Red Matter is beautifully inspired by the design of the ex-Soviet Union, and its cold war methodology. From architectural details like Volgravia’s crest to finely rendered designs on the clothing, it seems like Vertical Robot has left nothing to be picky about. The entire base whisks you back to the 1950’s, immersing you in a location that just begs to be explored.

And explore it you must, to learn as much as possible about what happened in this empty base whilst searching for clues that can help in the quest. Thankfully movement is well catered for, with short teleport dashes, smooth locomotion when teleporting feels too immersion breaking or then there’s the long jump (this is a low gravity installation) which is awesome and novel to begin with but too slow when nipping in between rooms.

A nice little feature thanks to Oculus Rift exclusivity are the inclusion of Oculus Touch controllers in the videogame. This adds that extra feeling of presence to the whole shebang, bringing the sensation of touch into play that haptic rumble feedback on its own just can’t match. And with the left controller there’s a host of additional functionality to choose from that’s quick and intuitive to pick.

On the actual puzzle side of things they never get too overly complicated or drawn out. It can at points seem like several tasks are somewhat similar – find this to unlock this…- yet the pacing is such that it never becomes boring or mundane. And should you get stuck simply stepping back and looking at your surroundings should help. Oh, and scan everything. This can get a bit repetitive – especially when the scanner locks onto another mug for the umpteenth time – and isn’t needed unless you’re a proper completionist but does help with longevity.

If there is one thing to moan about with Red Matter is its gameplay time. An initial gameplay session my take 5- 6 hours depending on how thorough you want to be, however a second quick play through will probably only last a couple of hours. And there’s no real hidden secrets that VRFocus could find, which reduces the need for further gameplay sessions.

All in all, Red Matter is a very high calibre VR experience, neatly weaving its story and puzzle elements together. It by no means perfect, following the line of other puzzles in VR that are seemingly unable to offer plenty of reasons to come back for more. So like a good meal take it slowly and savour the moment.

80%

Awesome

  • Verdict
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A Little Taste of What’s to Come in Red Matter

After revealing a launch date for its upcoming puzzle-solver Red Matter last week, indie developer Vertical Robot let VRFocus get some early hands-on time with the videogame. And of course we recorded some gameplay footage for our readers to enjoy.

Purely for Oculus Rift, Red Matter is a story-driven VR puzzle adventure experience set during a dystopian sci-fi Cold War. You play a secret agent, code named Epsilon, working for the Atlantic Union. You’ve been dispatched to an abandoned base on Rhea, one of Saturn’s moons, run by the People’s Republic of Volgravia to find top-secret information concerning the research being carried out there.

Having previously created surreal puzzle title Daedalus for Samsung Gear VR, Vertical Robot is turning its VR ambitions up a notch with Red Matter. The videogame is a far bigger and more involved experience than the studio’s first project, whilst still keeping with the puzzle genre its known for.

The gameplay video only shows a couple of areas as VRFocus wasn’t allowed to go too far into the videogame and spoil every before release. So you get a quick intro to the backstory, and then it’s planet side to begin the adventure. Both the Oculus Touch controllers have been mapped into the title, helping aid that sense of immersion that what you’re holding is what you’re actually seeing.

One of the neat little features in Red Matter is the movement system. As you’ll see it mixes teleportation with low gravity locomotion. So you can pop from point to point with air time sped up or decreased depending on how comfortable you are in VR. As this is only a early introduction to Red Matter the puzzles are expectedly easy to easy players in to the mechanics.

As for the rest of the videogame VRFocus can’t say anymore just at this moment. Be rest assured that a review will be coming soon.

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16 Minutes of ‘Red Matter’ Gameplay Revealed – a Sci-fi Soviet Retrofuture Adventure

Ahead of its launch later this month, we got a chance to dive into the beginning of Red Matter, an upcoming VR adventure puzzle exclusively for Oculus Rift that puts you in a wonderfully weird Soviet-style retrofuturistic world.

With launch quickly approaching, Spain-based developers Vertical Robot gave us the green light to show off a respectable chunk of the game’s beginning, which places you in the boots of an astronaut—Agent Epsilon of the vaguely American-sounding Atlantic Union.

Because we were only allowed to show so much in the press preview of the game, which let us experience the very beginning—a botched landing on a suspiciously Slavic-sounding Volgravian test site on Rhea, Saturn’s second-largest moon—we had to cut off right as we got deeper into the search for some key documents that would help us unravel the truth behind the test site.

We had a pretty similar experience jumping into Red Matter at its debut at Oculus Connect 4 last year, but one of the caveats at the time was we weren’t allowed to show anything but the vetted press images to go along with our written impressions. You can check out our hands-on here, which covers basically everything up until we hit the elevator, which in the OC4 demo was replaced with a mysteriously glowing substance. That’s gone (I think. I haven’t played past the preview’s cutoff).

At Red Matter‘s Oculus Connect debut, Design Director Tatiana Delgado told Road to VR the game’s Volgravian setting was a “cross between the encroaching surveillance of George Orwell’s dystopian societies and Kafka’s absurd bureaucracy.”

From what we’ve seen, Red Matter is shaping up to be a highly polished experience with plenty of intrigue to boot. A good measure of retro CRTs, propaganda posters, handy translator guns, and manipulator claws all make ridiculously charming experience thus far.

Delgado told me at the time that Red Matter was aiming for a 2.5-3 hour gameplay length, although they have since communicated that it will be closer to 3.5-4 hours. We’ll have our full review here at the game’s launch, which is slated for May 24th.

The post 16 Minutes of ‘Red Matter’ Gameplay Revealed – a Sci-fi Soviet Retrofuture Adventure appeared first on Road to VR.