[Mechanical R]

The first of soon to be many XNA games hit the stage last month, and to set it off, they started with the co-op game Schizoid.

The gameplay is something similar to that of Geometry Wars, in the sense of movement and the vast amount of levels. However this game is all about working with a partner, whether it being A.I or a second person to join in.

Your objective through the game is to control two coloured ships. One red/orange and the other being blue. Each level is filled with enemies also of colours red and blue. If an enemy of the opposite colour touches your ships, you lose a life. If one of the same colour hits your ships the enemies are killed. This ultimately is the aim of the game, with the use co-op tactics and power-ups to clear each level to progress to the next.

To make gameplay easily accessible, the game only uses the analogue sticks for direction. No other buttons are used, unless you’re pausing the game of course. Saying that, the game encourages the strong use of co-operative game play. Obviously it’s the aim of the game, but to make it through some of the tougher levels you’ll need to use your brainpower to work out the easiest and safest way, you may even need to use each other to take out other enemies.

The game has a Campaign filled with 100+ levels with a bronze, silver and gold reward system on each level based on how many lives you lost. Getting a gold medal (dying no times) will allow you to skip that level later when going through them again to continue with your campaign. If you’d rather just play singular levels, you can also pick those that you’ve previously completed to replay and better your skill.

These levels are playable with A.I, local and online co-op or with yourself with the painful ‘Uberzoid’. This game mode allows you to control both ships with each analogue stick which doubles the difficulty not only with what’s on screen, but where your fingers are going and where you’re sending your ships.

Visually the game is clean and well made with no nasty sharp edges or problems ruining the experience. As well as that, music doesn’t play a key note in this game, so feel free to play your own tunes through here to keep yourself in the mood.

The campaign holds more than 5 hours of gameplay in itself, with enough to keep people going for a long time with difficulties and online side.

Overall, Schizoid is a good game to start XNA with, with the game being original but also taking good elements from games like Geo Wars, I’ve got high hopes for the future XNA games.

Rating – 7.8

Published by: Microsoft
Developed by: Torpex Games
Genre: Action