There was a time — and a platform — in which Wonderglade proved a likable little collection of minigames, but that time has long since passed.
Arriving today on Oculus Quest, Wonderglade is a port of Resolution Games’ first title for the long-forgotten Google Daydream platform. On that three degrees of freedom (3DOF) headset, the studio gradually rolled out a handful of carnival-themed minigames like golf and putting out cardboard fires with a hose. Now the full set arrives with updated 6DOF controls but, like other 3DOF ports such as Fail Factory, Wonderglade finds itself stuck in the past.
Clearly this isn’t a title designed for the most demanding of VR enthusiasts but instead perhaps their children. And Wonderglade’s six minigames may offer a few hours of mindless distraction for younger children (which, we’d note, we wouldn’t recommend you let experience VR anyway). Tellingly, even your virtual hands are alarmingly small in this game.
Half of the experiences do carry some simple thrills. Tip N Tilt Racing has you rotating a controller to race ballooned animals around farm-themed levels as quickly as possible and Tinder Town’s wave-based fire extinguishing has its charms. Tiny Tee Golf doesn’t offer anything like the depth of, say, Pro Putt Golf, but it’s probably the game’s best pass-and-play experience for families to enjoy.
Even then, though, any momentary fun is quickly forgotten. Less successful are the other half of games that either don’t have much substance to them or don’t translate to 6DOF VR very well. Bistro Basher simply requires you to waggle a controller over food items as quickly as possible to smash them, while Hamster Hoops’ wonky throwing mechanics make it tough to score baskets. Magic Mayhem has you tapping projectiles mid-air with the end of a staff which… is about as fun as that sounds.
As you play you can earn tickets for new cosmetic items, and some of the games do have small ‘campaigns’ to see through, but you’ll have seen all Wonderglade has to offer over the course of about 30 minutes. Also (and I realise this is kicking something when it’s down) I really can’t stand the kid that leads you through the tutorial. Stop shouting at me, please.
Wonderglade Review – Like This? Try These
Fail Factory offers a similar level of time-killing minigame chaos but its follow-up, Sports Scramble, is much better and designed specifically for Quest.
Wonderglade Review Final Impressions
With Daydream dead and Oculus Go winding down, I can understand why Resolution Games wants to get its existing library of content onto Oculus Quest. But the fact is some of its once-novel concepts were best left to memory, and Wonderglade is very much one of those games. This is a 50/50 set of harmless or boring experiences that don’t really have any place on a 6DOF platform and, whatever the target audience you’re buying for, you could do better.
Wonderglade is available from today on the Oculus Quest headsets. For more on how we arrived at this verdict, see the UploadVR Review Scale below and check out our review guidelines.
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