Hands-on: Eve: Valkyrie is more than just a tech demo

For a game that’s been in development for nearly three years, that Eve: Valkyrie‘s public appearances have been limited to little more than elaborate tech demos is a worry. Sure, they’ve been smooth and very pretty tech demos—and some of the best demonstrations of the nascent virtual reality platforms—but they’ve all been devoid of any sense of how the game might actually function as a game, let alone did they provide a convincing reason for fans to strap an expensive brick of plastic to their faces for an hour or two.

But, with the likes of the Oculus Rift—where Eve: Valkyrie will be bundled with pre-orders—HTC Vive, and PlayStation VR all due for release in the first half of 2016, Valkyrie has finally had a more complete outing. Officially, the game’s in “pre-alpha,” but it is largely feature complete.

There’s been a lot of confusion and mixed messages regarding what’s actually in Eve: Valkyrie, so here are the facts: Valkyrie is primarily a competitive, team-based multiplayer game, but PvE content is going to be available from the outset. That PvE content does not include any kind of campaign mode, although some light storytelling does exist.

There are three PvE modes to choose from, each designed to deliver a slightly different experience. “Recall” sees you dive into DNA fragments recovered from dead pilots to relive their memories, thus providing a pretext to matches against bots. I played a Recall called Convoy, where I had to protect a small fleet of friendly ships against an enemy ambush, complete with small chunks of narrative that flesh out the world as I played.

“Survival” is, you’ll be shocked to hear, all about surviving. It’s the same mode you’ve no doubt played a thousand times before in many other games, and sees you battling against wave after wave of enemies that grow increasingly stronger in quantity and quality. For quieter moments there’s “Scout,” which rids the maps of enemies and instead focuses on exploration. You might want to brush up on your flight skills by performing tight turns and rolls around a space station, or hunt down out the nuggets of information that pop up as you fly by important structures, again helping to flesh out Valkyrie‘s world.

Suffice it to say, none of the PvE modes are that exciting. The main event is competitive play. While the game modes and loadout options mimic those seen in any number of first-person shooters, the virtual VR environment adds a whole new dimension (sorry) to the action. Indeed, after getting my hands dirty with the blood of space-faring enemies, it’s difficult to lament the inclusion of familiar rules and options. There are enough new interactions and perspectives to worry about mastering as it is, making the inclusion of some recognisable elements more than welcome. In turn, this provides a non-threatening gateway into what is a whole new way of playing a videogame, and indeed a whole medium.

At its core, competitive play comes down to shooting anything red, and working alongside anything blue. In Team Deathmatch, for instance, distant enemy ships are highlighted with a small red square that frames them against distant stars and planets. As you get closer that square morphs into a circular reticule that assists your aim, with specific visual quirks employed depending on your chosen ship and gun combination.

Teams are made up of a maximum of five players, with each death depleting a set number of tickets assigned to each team. Lose all of your tickets, lose the game. Alternatively, if you’re playing under a time limit, the team with the least tickets remaining once the clock reaches zero loses.

The “Control” game mode (a work-in-progress moniker) is what Call of Duty players might know as Domination, the goal being to take ownership of up to three control points scattered around the map. In order to encourage players not to camp, you deploy stationery drones that passively control the area for you. The team with the most drones at a control point can score points from it before the opposition gets its act together and destroys them with their blasters. As with Team Deathmatch, you can’t go wrong if you stick to the “kill red stuff” mantra. Enemy drones glow red in order to prevent savvy players tucking them away in positions or and against backdrops that would otherwise make them invisible.

A whole new way of dogfighting

While the rules are familiar, the moment-to-moment action is anything but. Moving your head around is key to attaining plenty of kills and reducing your deaths, the complete field of vision allowing you to track multiple targets in a manner that simply hasn’t been possible with a single monitor. If an enemy speeds past you, you don’t need to turn your ship around to follow them—which would cause you to lose track of the target you’re already stalking—you can simply turn your head to look above and behind you.

This allows you to monitor dangers all around you while simultaneously carrying on to your next objective. It sounds like a small thing, but its impact on how you move is startling. The players that realise the enormous gains to be made from VR and its more immersive viewpoint will be those that dominate Valkyrie‘s online arenas next year.

Naturally, specific strategies will vary depending on the map, and the ship. The first map I played was sparsely populated, with a few very large ships dotted about the place that were too far away from each other to use as cover. Staying alive meant keeping a sharp eye for danger, and acting quickly before foes could outflank me. Taking an active role by triggering others to react to my attacks was a good tactic for controlling more of the battlefield.

Another map was far more cluttered, set around the scaffold-like structure of an enormous space station. There were plenty of docking bays, connecting tunnels, and large capsules to use as a means of both escaping the sights of an enemy, and launching surprise attacks against them from unexpected angles. While you can move slowly, you can’t stop and hover in space, however. Those looking to hide behind a lump of metal until someone happens to wander past are out of luck.

Maximum movement speed is defined by the ship, with three options to choose from. Fighters are good all-rounders, offering a middling balance between speed, armour, and firepower. Support ships are essentially medics that are slower, but able to buff friendly shields and—if you’re feeling adventurous—deplete the shields of enemies. The Heavy option is the tank of the Valkyrie fleet, with incredibly robust armour plating and powerful short-range weapons taking priority over all else. That concentration on defence results in an incredibly poor top speed, though.