Scott Watson reviews WipEout Omega Collection…
The WipEout series was a style of racing game that passed me by back in the early days of Playstation. I can’t believe it’s been over 20 years since the original first graced the Sony consoles and was a major seller. I couldn’t get to grips with its speed and style of racing back then, yet its return now feels far more appropriate, far more relevant than I was expecting.
The Omega Collection pretty much consists of the final three entries in the series before the sad end to Studio Liverpool. Bundling HD and Fury from the PlayStation 3, and the Vita’s 2048, this collection is pretty much the pinnacle of WipEout and a real must have, not just for those of us looking for a nostalgia trip but for anyone with a love of seat of your pants, blink and you’ll miss it, racing action.
This collection has been shown much love and attention to make it such a complete racing package. Everything about the game is clean, hyper-stylised, futuristic, everything you would expect from a futuristic hover car racing game! From the interface right through to the racing itself, there is a place for everything and everything in its place where it should be, where you would expect it to be. The aesthetics of the game are just ridiculously crisp, super-defined and beautiful to behold.
The menus make it very easy to get straight into your preferred choice from the three series, you pick your beautifully sleek ship dependent on whether it’s a straight out race, battle, time trial or other and away you go. The tracks themselves are stunning. Speeding along in 1080p at 60fps the game flies along, you fly along and it is all so majestic, all so sleek and futuristic and sadly too fast for my old man’s reflexes!
I love this game to bits, I’m just not very good at it at all due to its speed. Perhaps I’m doing myself a disservice here, let me rephrase this. I can play a decent enough majority of this game, but at a point around the B Class races my reflexes just cannot keep up with the game. That element of it makes me sad.
For all its beauty, cleanliness, sleekness and crispness it can be a totally unforgiving game as you progress up the ranks. The ships get faster, those turns come upon you quicker and the AI opponents become more ruthless and it makes me feel old. I’d complain but it’s no fault of the game, just me.
There’s so much bundled into this you really cannot fault it at all. We live in a period of gaming where remasters and remakes are part of the norm. Thankfully, the WipEout Omega Collection is anything but normal. It’s a racing series long overdue a return and one that feels and plays just as good now, if not better than it did on its first appearance.
Pros
+ Aesthetically Stunning
+ Tight controls across exciting tracks
+ Completely spoiled for choice for racing options
Cons
– It gets too fast!
Reviewed on PlayStation 4
Rating: 10/10
Scott Watson
Originally published June 24, 2017. Updated April 16, 2018.
