Racing across the surface of Mars in vehicles called Skimmers that look like podracers from Star Wars sounds cool, but where Vector 36 is really setting itself apart and going the extra mile is in its customization and Garage area. Prebuilt Skimmers are available, but players can alter multiple components of their Skimmer to get the best performance. These components include areas like Cockpit, Thrust, Lift Vectors, Radiators, Power, Gyro, Fuel, and ECU. Different parts can be purchased from the Shop from in-game credits earned by winning races. Criteria like Price, Weight, Durability, and Heat to factor into not only your purchasing decision, but also how you place them on your Skimmer.
Placing items onto your Skimmer is a little cumbersome, but if the part is highlighted in blue it’s a fit, in red it’s not, and you can also set a bias on the part to shift its weight around some. Advanced users can work with this to help generate a better drift around turns to shave off precious seconds on their split times going between the race checkpoints. Physics make a big difference in Vector 36 as you have to account for part placement and bias, weight distribution, and temperature as well (lest your Skimmer catch fire during a race… yeah that’s happened to me).
Controls are pretty intuitive, but the three part tutorial is understandably a must. It takes you through Orientation, Basics, and Advanced tiers, beginning with turning your Skimmer on (press Start) and managing its height, tilt, propulsion, and so forth. It comes together fairly naturally, but this one of those VR games that does give me some physical discomfort after twenty to thirty minutes of play. It’s not so much just being in the first person view or the speed (which is awesome especially as you upgrade your thrust) at which the Skimmer is moving, it’s the simultaneous moving in one direction while also looking into another direction. Granted, this only happens in races, which would be the only playable portion of the game were it not for the Garage and Shop which you’ll actually spend a decent amount of time in tinkering with your Skimmer.
Current race modes include Practice, Quick Races, and Tournaments, with more in development including multiplayer support due out sometime in Q2 of this year. There are five different race tracks that you can unlock as you play and place, and these include various Martian landscapes with rock walls and cool sci-fi tech structures. Pathways are generously large, typically, allowing you and the other racers ample room to move around in so as to not bump into the surfaces or each other if possible as that factors into the Durability metric and how quickly your parts get damaged.
Red River has other goals road-mapped like Pilot customization, more Skimmers, additional tracks, multiplayer support, as well to look forward to. Even at this relatively early stage, Vector 36 is a cool VR experience that has a lot of further potential, and one race fans and gearheads will want to keep an eye on.
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