Viveport Review: Ready Player One: OASIS Beta

Step into the thriving and beautiful world of the Oasis to find adventure, danger, and death at every turn.

By Joshua Hawkins, Greenlit Content

Steven Spielberg’s big screen rendition of Ready Player One has been taking the world by storm, and the virtual reality focused story has quite a bit to bring to the table when you think about many of the experiences brought to life within it. In an attempt to capture this same beauty and chaos, several developers teamed up together to bring the world of Ready Player One to life in Ready Player One: OASIS. The experience just hit beta, and it’s one of the most promising virtual reality tie-ins we’ve ever seen for a motion picture.

The basic idea behind Ready Player One: OASIS is to bring several different experiences together under one big umbrella. As a beta, the experience is set to grow and evolve over the coming months as new experiences are added to help bring the world of Ready Player One to life even more. Right now, though, players can dive into the experience and try their hand at three different games including Battle for the Oasis, Gauntlet, and Rise of the Gunters. Each experience is different and offers an excellent view of what virtual reality has to offer in the long-run.

Gauntlet was by far one of my favorite pieces of the experience, as it drops players into an endless dungeon that they must navigate and search through as they collect treasure and take out undead enemies trying to kill them. It features bow-based combat, and it’s definitely something you’ll need some skill to get good at. The environments are beautifully rendered, and the almost endless amount of rooms to explore makes it a perfect piece for fantasy buffs.

If you enjoy more wave-based experiences, though, then Battle for the Oasis is what you’re looking for. While it doesn’t offer anything new to the wave-based genre, it’s still a brilliant experience with some fantastic sounds and visuals. You take out enemies using an array of different weapons from shotguns to pistols. It’s a fun romp through the world, and with different levels to take on, it’s sure to keep you busy for a good little bit.

Rise of the Gunters takes on more of an 80s arcade game feel, though, and while your goals is pretty similar to that of Battle for the Oasis, you aren’t locked down into one place. You can teleport around the world, or even strafe using free movement. It’s fast, it’s frantic, and it’s beautiful. This is the type of experience that you’ll want to avoid if you are prone to motion sickness, which is a shame as it is by far one of the strongest experiences out there.

My only big complaint with Ready Player One: OASIS is that right now, things are tough to navigate when you first hop into the game. There’s no prompts to tell you how to move to the different planets and games, and you’re just kind of left wandering around until you sort things out. The HUD also feels a bit weird, as it is tied directly to your headset visor, which means it turns with you as you lean and rock to avoid shots. That’s definitely not something worth knocking it down for, though, and Ready Player One: OASIS has a bright future ahead of it if the developers continuing doing what they’ve started. I, for one, cannot wait to see what the future holds as new content becomes available in the OASIS.

Ready Player One: OASIS Beta is available on Viveport.