- Developer: Gateway Interactive
- Publisher: Mastertronic
- Price: $7.49 USD game only/$12.49 USD game and soundtrack
Music in video games is as important to me as the gameplay itself. That being said, many rhythm/music games seem to be solely guitars, drums, or what have you. Not too often do we see game developers break the mold so to say, and go outside the box. Thankfully Spectra adds new features to an old formula that turns into a pretty fun game overall, but not without some problems.
Spectra, a game made by the fine folks over at Gateway Interactive, is a futuristic “racing” title. I put racing in quotes because while your objective is to reach the end of the level in the shortest amount of time possible, there are bonuses to be had to players who are willing to risk it all for the sake of their multiplier. You race on multiple different levels each with different music, which we will discuss more on in a minute. What Spectra does that I haven’t seen in many games of this type is if you jump off the edge, yet find your way back on, you get what is called an air bonus. Doing these can increase your multiplier just as quick as obtaining the orbs around the level. Score junkies will take advantage of this and make some insane numbers on the leader board, leading to some replay ability.
The music makes or breaks the game, as it is the showcase piece. Spectra has some of the best trance/techno type music I have heard in quite a while. Each stage has it’s own song and as someone who has a mild interest in this music genre, I feel the music fits the game play perfectly. If you are a fan of challenging risk/reward game play, you may be able to deal with the music not being to your taste, but many may be turned off just by the music alone. At the end of the day it is a taste thing, and nothing you can fault the developer for.
There is not too much to the game to be honest. You attempt to go from the start to the finish while at the same time reaching the best multiplier you can to increase your score. Add obstacles and many different paths along the way and you have a game that could take a while to master the best way to score points.
Other then that, there isn’t too much to this one. At the end of the day I feel this comes down to your taste in music, so I won’t do a recommended or not recommended this time. I’ll leave it at this. If you are interested in the techno/dance music scene, give this game a look. The soundtrack alone is worth the price of the game+soundtrack bundle. However, if you are not a fan, I would recommend looking up some gameplay videos, and see if this is the type of game you would be interested in.
