Game Reviews

Race the Sun

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| Race the Sun
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Race the Sun
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| Race the Sun

In Race the Sun, you control a solar powered aircraft battling against an ever-setting sun.

The moment you jet off you'll find yourself in a world of minimalist yet beautiful shapes, gently sauntering from side to side using the silky smooth controls to avoid obstacles and collect pickups.

As you progress through each region, both the music and landscapes ramp up in difficulty and drama.

Clusters of boulders, cuboid jungles, falling platforms, and giant silhouetted caterpillars leave you weaving as best you can before an inevitable head-on collision.

Learning the layouts of each stage is key to a smooth run, but with the entire world recreated every 24 hours, you'll never hold the high score for too long.

On-board snacks

The sunset can be kept at bay with one pickup, and will prove essential if you plan on making your way past the second level. If you miss too many, your ship will slow down to a halt when the sun eventually sets, but not before exploding for good measure.

Two other key power-ups are jumps and emergency portals. Jumps propel you up in the air, allowing you to avoid obstacles and find items; while emergency portals let you pick up where you left off after wrecking your ride.

The most common pickups on the field are Tris, increasing your multiplier and in turn, score.

Scattered elsewhere about each level are the means for couple of sneaky shortcuts. The first is a teleporter, instantly sending you to the end of your stage. The second is much more rare - a hidden portal that takes you to a bonus stage laden with Tris.

In-flight entertainment

The main campaign of Race the Sun issues you with a series of challenges. Completing each unlocks each element of the game, making it an hour-long tutorial of sorts.

Trouble is, once you reach level 25 and unlock everything, any remaining challenges you had disappear. This is a shame as I feel I missed out on completing interestings tasks like completing two stages without ever moving to the right.

There are, however, two unlockable extra modes. Apocalypse mode is much faster and less forgiving, with the world falling apart around you. Labyrinth mode has you flipping switches, collecting light bulbs, and avoiding dead ends in an oddly different scenario.

You are left with each mode's daily leaderboard as your final, neverending challenge. Trouble is, the journey there was enough for me.

Race the Sun

Race the Sun is a blast while it lasts, but there may not be enough to bring you back after the first couple of enjoyable hours of gameplay
Score
Danny Russell
Danny Russell
After spending years in Japan collecting game developers' business cards, Danny has returned to the UK to breed Pokemon. He spends his time championing elusive region-exclusive games while shaking his fist at the whole region-locking thing.