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I imported the game a while back and have it basically 100% completed including the DLC. Honestly, there is not much to say besides what has been said already, but the chances are that you are going to love this game. It's unique, and an experience that has a lot of love put into it.
Pros:
-Smooth mechanics, basically the whole reason you play this game is to experience the gravity movement.
-Humongous and very interesting steam-punk-ish cities.
-Interesting characters and story even though a lot of questions were left over after beating the game.
Cons:
-Lag. There were parts of the game that grinded to a complete halt due to lag as well as noticeable lag in battles and sometimes in big cities, however this didn't happen too often and didn't bother me when it did.
-Difficulty vs mechanics. When the battles get difficult latter in the game and in the DLC the mechanics don't make up for it. It can get frustrating only being able to attack straight-on especially when you need to use the touch screen dodge mechanic over and over again, however I have found there are solid strategies to defeating every enemy that maybe weren't so apparent at first.
-Lack of things to do. There's story missions, leader board type side missions (races, beating Nevi for points, etc.), and gem collecting. After you finish the story missions, the game feels pretty empty. Oh yeah, there's also DLC and secret really strong Nevi to beat that were a nice addition but only extended the gameplay for a couple hours.
I know my cons section was extensive, but you can pretend it doesn't exist, because they don't significantly detract from the overall experience. If you like video games (I hate that stupid line from gamefly commercials), then you should really pick this one up.
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While not a perfect experience, Gravity Rush is an excellent demonstration of the Vita being more than a port machine designed for cash-in HD Collections, and goes a long way in restoring some play time to my dust-layered handheld.After a questionably unnecessary tap or two, the game starts with your hero, Kat, groggily lifting her head, clueless to her surroundings and even her identity. She's dressed like some ornamental grasshopper, her eyes are a rabid shade of red and she's introduced to a very strange cat: this is pretty much all the storyline you get for a while.
The game doesn't give you much peace before introducing you to the core mechanic, gravity shifting. It was about ten seconds after this that I flung my character into a black hole, which was the beginning of wrapping my head around a gameplay structure I never really experienced before. You main movement is done by first defying gravity with a push of the right trigger, aiming the camera where you want to go with the right analog or tilting the Vita, and hitting right trigger again to shift downward gravity in that direction. You can sorta move your character around while "flying," but the most accurate method is always to double-tap the trigger aiming where you wish to "fall." To return to the standard gravity takes just a quick push of the left trigger. All of that plus a weird Megaman-ish gravity slide along the ground makes up your transportation methods.
This works beautifully 99% of the time, and once you get over the initial confusion, you'll feel like some sort of Spider-Man side character using your own unique way of zipping through the city. And speaking of the city, man, that place is pretty huge. I don't just mean for a handheld game, either. For giving a massive sense of scale, I haven't seen a game pull it off as well as Gravity Rush has since...Shadow of the Colossus, perhaps? And it's nowhere near as static/uninteractive as I first feared: pedestrians cower, rails and pillars collapse from your battles and each city sector you go through has a distinct feel to it thanks to a diverse, orchestral soundtrack. You really have to play it yourself to see how incredibly detailed the city structure is, because pretty much every screenshot ever makes it look like leftover footage from Superman 64.
The city and gameplay compliment each other nicely, but of course the rest of the game needs a wee bit more than that. In comes your shadowy, pink-and-black monsters called Nevi. I keep reading it as Navi while playing: I think that's what makes killing them so much more fun. But anywho, Nevi come in multiple forms and sizes, can either dominate the land or air, but their one signature weakness is the pink orb or two on their bodies. Barring your occasional armor plating, that's your bullseye, that's all you have to focus on. Very little in the way of pattern memorization or outsmarting them, just seek and destroy with the combat system.
And this is where things get a little sketchy. See, you have one basic land attack, one basic air attack, and while both can be upgraded to increase damage and complexity, neither one ever really feels efficient when dealing with enemies. Your land kick is obviously going to keep you grounded, but your aerial attack is an all-out charging bull maneuver. That charge attack works fine for a few hours, but then you get these hopping jerkfaces with orbs out of reach from the ground, and they kinda love to hop out of your way while you Bruce Lee right by without leaving a scratch. Later on, the flying enemy with its own charging attack shows up, and these fights consist of the two (or five) of you zipping by each other like a bunch of rams blindly trying to headbutt each other. True, you upgrade a throw attack to toss any spare junk lying around, plus there's the several super attacks which can devastate the horde pretty quickly, but those aren't always available options. Combine this with missions that increasingly rely on combat and less on the clever platforming, you begin to see how this is an issue. Protip: never be still.
While the combat never really takes off, other missions stand out as surprisingly clever and memorable. From the schoolgirl mode that sends you on multiple false leads to fourth-wall-breaking fetch quests, the characters and goals are excellent. Sometimes you even leave the main city, combining the joys of exploration with an even greater appreciation for just how big the game tries to be. Bonus missions like races and combat scoring go the extra mile in adding content, mainly because they can be brutal in their qualifications and conditions.
While some games on the Vita try to be just like their home console version and fail horribly at presentation (Mortal Kombat's Johnny Cage looks like a fifty-year-old man with an afro), Gravity Rush has a look that fits the console perfectly. I even like most of the touch/motion controls. To hell with Uncharted and WipEout. THIS is the game to display the Vita as a true handheld capable of its own experiences, similar to the Pokemon or Mario & Luigi games Nintendo brings to their handhelds. Completely unique in gameplay, massive in spatial scope and memorable in character, Gravity Rush is, more than any other game so far, a reason to buy a Vita.
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As you play through Gravity Rush, two things become increasingly clear. In my review, I will talk about just these two things.First of all, and especially towards the beginning of the game, it becomes clear that Gravity Rush is by no means a perfect game. Like many reviews have highlighted throughout the internet, controlling protagonist Kat around her world is amazing when under no pressure from enemies, time or both. However, when you are put under one of these pressures, things can get hectic to the point where I was even mildly frustrated in some of the more intense fights or races. Part of this is due to the not entirely reliable lock on of some of Kat's attacks. It is also partly due to the nature of the game which literally has you fighting upside down, making for an epic look but not the smoothest experience. Beyond the controls, the town is vast and beautiful, but a tad empty. The story is extremely charming (it feels a lot like a Miyasaki film) yet tends to switch gears a lot and what little plot is there is kind of hard to follow. And loading times for certain challenges are way too long.
The second thing you realize playing Gravity Rush is that all of those faults mentioned above simply do not matter. This is one of the best games to have come out in quite some time, and not just for the Vita or handhelds alone. The entire experience is so incredibly magical, so incredibly exhilirating, and so incredibly fun that any and all faults in the game are forgotten the second they pass. I cannot remember the last time simply moving around in a videogame made me smile so much. I cannot remember the last time I spent so much time just moving around a virtual world exploring and taking in it's beauty. This is truly a unique experience, enhanced all the more by an amazing soundtrack and one of the most likeable protagonists I've seen in years. You might not always be able to keep track of Gravity Rush's story, but you will always enjoying going along for the ride.
Gravity Rush may not be perfect, but many of the best things in life never are. At the end of the day, it's fault don't matter because it offers one of the most original and enjoyable experiences to grace videogames in years. If you own a Vita, it would be a crime to let this game pass you by. And if you do not own a Vita, then it may be time to consider getting one.
Honest reviews on Gravity Rush - PlayStation Vita
At first I wrote off this game as another Japanese game that would have a very limited appeal in the US.Then I played it. The game is original; this hasn't been done before. The characters are very likable, and the gameplay is great.
The hero in the game is a girl named Kat (I'd guess around 16). Other games with female characters tend to use female attributes to make the game appeal to males. This one does not; Kat, while very likable really doesn't have nor uses any of those shallow tricks. The game story has side quests where others will say detrimental things to the character about her looks, etc, but she takes it in stride. The hero is just a good person that wants to do good things and is VERY powerful with what makes her special, and wins over her peer group eventually. Her "romantic interest" (though its pretty much all platonic) seems to be a very bumbling average guy...not the pick of the litter by far. So, in that respect, I think this is a great game for pre-teen or teen girls who may be struggling with issues common in that age group.
With that said, the game should be enjoyable by pretty much anyone. I'm a 37 year old man, and I loved it.
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