Hands-on | Plain Sight

Format: PC/PS3/Wii | Genre: Multiplayer action | Publisher: Beatnik Games | Developer: Beatnik Games | ETA: 22/03/10 (PC) Q1 2011 (consoles)

Even if you get all that right, your nefarious foe can block you with a simple click. Blocks are limited stock, mind you, with each player starting off the game with a set number per life.

Beatnik hopes that the simplicity of the core actions (attack, block and explode) combined with an absence of a range of weaponry will give the game pick-up-and-play value. The team also hopes that the sum of these simple parts, combined with other facets of the game, will allow for a diversity of strategies. It’s a tough balance to reach for, but the game has been in beta now for many months, there’s hope it’s a balance they’ve nailed with the aid of all that feedback.

Whether that balance is there or not was never going to be revealed by some brief hands-on time. Nonetheless, the controls prove simple enough and the camera responds nicely to my movements and the world shifting around me. To my tiny ninja bot the world seems plenty large, but I’m assured that this map is actually one of the smallest in the game by some way.

I set to the task of getting locked onto a Beatnik victim – a task that presents quite a challenge at first, even with some easing off the accelerator from my opponents. As simple as the controls are, there’s some getting used to the scale of the game, the lock-on shooting, and what generally feels like a third-person multiplayer game with first-person shooter elements. Nonetheless, I soon masterfully pull off my first frag with a direct hit, courtesy of one flaming katana.

That’s the signal of ‘Game On’ for my Beatnik foes, and all mercy drains away. It’s an absolute barrage: fragged, exploded, fragged again. Maybe this is what happens when you turn up late – future visitors to Beatnik, be warned. After several deaths in a row, I find a power-up that makes me even tinier. This is one of several power-ups, including the one that sets your katana aflame. In my miniscule form I go hunting for revenge, only to run into an absolute goliath of a robot who is at least 20 times my size. Aiming up an attack on Robot Kong proves easy, but it’s even easier for him to deflect me away with the powerful shield he’s built up. I attempt a cunning explosion but it’s mistimed, the second or so pre-a-splode enough for any non-collateral damage to escape. All this just after a few minutes of play, and the lunacy of this bizarre scenario has me wanting more. Specifically, revenge.

On top of all this, there are in-game perks to purchase between frags, which last for the whole match, but not permanently. The better you do, the more you can spend, and these perks can make you jump higher, run faster, have access to a powerful shield, and more. There are 30 of these in-game perks in total, including uber-ranks which can be purchased after racking up a certain set of regular perks. There isn’t enough time to see one of these uber-ranks in action, but I’m definitely coloured a bright shade of intrigued.

REASONS TO BE CHEERFUL
While I’m excited about Plain Sight at this stage, there remains a fear of how players will take to a such an unusual, exclusively multiplayer game, and even more of how the titular balance will work out with sustained play. It sounds good on paper, even looks great after a brief run-through, but keeping the playing field even while allowing for skill to pervade through is tricky in any multiplayer game. When it’s the focus of said game, all eyes are going to be on how it functions.

But Beatnik has been ticking all the right boxes so far, and the protracted beta must have given the team valuable information. So let’s stay positive, as there are plenty of reasons to be excited about this indie game’s potential. Such as how there are other game modes to give the game longevity, like Team Deathmatch, Capture the Flag, and the wonderfully titled and oddly self-explanatory co-op mode, ‘Ninja! Ninja! Ninja! Robotzilla!’. Then there’s the two console releases expected early next year and a tentative look towards introducing motion control for both the PS3 and Wii versions, exciting in itself.

And then there’s the suicidal ninja robots. Did I mention them? By Sinan Kubba

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