S#arp Shooter (Sharp Shooter) is a procedurally generated first-person shooter for the HTC Vive, where the enemy spawn position and quantity and the weapon's fire rate are all based on the music soundtrack from your own library. I really couldn't understand how original and cool this idea was until I watched the trailer. Oh boy, I was so amused by it and laughed so hard, not because it wasn't good, but because it was so damn original and captivating.
It's exactly those unique ideas that I'm looking for to play and not just in VR. Every now and then comes a developer that really brings something else to the table, and S#arp Shooter is definitely one of those games. Just keep in mind that as of the time of writing the game is still in development and I'm basing my opinion based on the multimedia materials released for the press and those found online.
In Sharp Shooter you take part in classic action movie sequences. You choose your preferred soundtrack, which can be obviously anything that you like, like a heavy metal, pop song, techno, etc. The cool thing is that the game was designed so the location of which the enemy spawn and the weapon fire adapts to the rhythm of the soundtrack. So it's kind of a musical rhythmic game in a way. The game supports all the popular music file types, including MP3, WAV, and AAC among others.
I always love to listen to songs when I play some games, it just makes the whole experience much better. Hey, I even listen to music while playing Overwatch, but I do make it not that loud so I can hear my buddies talking while we play. So what better than being able to play a game that is gameplay is music oriented and because I really love first-person shooters, S#arp Shooter is really tailored for gamers like myself.
It's hard to comprehend what this game is about by just reading about it. You have to watch the Spooky Scary Skeletons (The Tombstone Remix) trailer to just understand why this game is so cool and innovative. There are many rhythmic VR games out there, but only a few of them are played like a first-person shooter game. So I believe that many FPS fans will definitely enjoy playing this game as well.
In Sharp Shooter you gain additional points for headshots and there is a song-based leaderboard where you can see how you performed in specific soundtracks. On the official website the developer also mentioned that there will be an ability to play music from SoundCloud, there will be voice recognition and more scenes, enemies and guns will be added to the game. I agree it would be awesome to have many different types of guns, even some really crazy submachine guns can be so cool.
S#arp Shooter is definitely a great VR game to look out for. The game is coming to both HTC Vive and Oculus Rift headsets. According to the game's Steam page, the game only works with a VR headset and requires a play area of at least 2x1.5 meters and 360-degree tracking. As you can see, I'm really impressed with what I've seen so far and we really need more of these type of original games, well done devs!
So when the game comes out? Well, it listed as "Coming Soon" on the game's Steam page, so let's hope that it is indeed coming soon.
Image credit: Complex Infinity