AVICII Invector: Encore Edition Review

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Fast Facts

Live a Life You Will Remember

Rhythm games are plentiful on the Quest 2, from wildly recognized hits like Beat Saber, Pistol Whip, Audica, and Synth Riders. There’s also a generally unknown corner of indie rhythm games that deserve the spotlight like Unplugged, Ragnarok, Smash Drums, and Thumper. AVICII Invector: Encore Edition borrows a lot from Thumper and turns the hit music from AVICII into a motion and timed-button press virtual reality game.

Music + Spacecraft

Tim Bergling is known to most people as AVICII. He died in 2018 and had helped to bring his music and video game dream to many before his passing. AVICII Invector has been released on most consoles by now and finally flies into Virtual Reality. 

High Scoring Soundtrack

Each track in the AVICII list slaps, as the kids say, and you will undoubtedly find a song you enjoy. Your level selection screen is colorful and will vary based on your unlocked tracks in the campaign. Each track has a high score you are trying to beat and there are leaderboards to see how you rank. 

Keep the Beat

While I am not the most rhythmically talented person, I found the easy and mid-range levels to be fine for me. Once you work towards the higher difficulty levels though your fingers and thumbsticks are bound to get a workout. The music ‘notes’ are placed throughout the level and you slide across the race track to the beat of the music. Hitting a button that corresponds to a note on the track at the precise time nets you the most points. You can build up a multiplier which is a staple in the rhythm genre. Sustaining your multiplier longer will help you reach the high scores and higher-tiered difficulty levels.

Riding the Rhythm

There is a campaign of sorts that has you play through the songs and is cut with animated scenes between, but that isn’t core to the gameplay and is more of a way to take a break as you work through the tracks. In between the track notes, there are parts where your spaceship will need to navigate through rings in the sky, which I found to be somewhat difficult in terms of lining up and maintaining the correct altitude as you weave around mountains.

I Think I Just Died
And Went to Heaven

Since the game is primarily played with button presses and you are wearing an HMD in the VR version of the game, there is a subtle visual queue as to what buttons you need to press. For instance, the controller and button location is represented in the larger lettered circle and there’s a dot to the top or bottom to help you remember which button you need to press. Since you can see more of the playfield in VR it is a bit easier, in my opinion, to get ready for your next button press.

There’s an Endless Road To Rediscover

Visually the game looks like a minimalistic and futuristic light show of sorts. You pilot a spacecraft along the tracks and across the open space. From time to time you need to use the boost to propel yourself through the rings and through the track faster. You can shift from side to side and sometimes need to turn up the tunnel walls, but mostly you will be jumping to the beat as you press the corresponding buttons.

And Love Is a Prize

AVICII Invector: Encore Edition has a great soundtrack that you should find a few tracks that you fancy. Overall the gameplay loop and high score chase element will either hook you or be something you don’t care much for. I don’t have any friends that own the game, so the only scores I see are my daughter’s and my own. She and I aren’t all too competitive, though she does trounce me in Beat Saber. If you like even a small portion of AVICII’s music and are a rhythm game enthusiast I think you should give the game a go.

4 out of 5

4

You can buy Avicii Invector: Encore Edition for Oculus Quest 2 here.