#Ultratron ratings upgrade#

The checkpoint system essentially breaks the experience down into ten level blocks you feel the need to perfect, and it’s a highly compelling system. However, the brilliant motivator behind it is that urge to create for yourself the perfect playthrough one where your upgrades are well considered, where you don’t lose shields too often so you can buy the more advanced weaponry. As such Ultratron isn’t as difficult as many of its ilk, and with a little perseverance you can make it through even the most difficult sections. Defeat the boss and you activate a checkpoint, meaning if you die you can restart from this point, with all your upgrades and coins intact.

#Ultratron ratings upgrade#

It ties the experience together wonderfully, creating a multitude of potential upgrade paths, motivations, and combat scenarios.Īt the end of every tenth level is a boss and a checkpoint. You can’t buy everything you want, coins aren’t dropped generously enough, and in fact the coins also de-spawn rather quickly, encouraging you to collect them whilst possibly exposing yourself to danger. Additionally you’re challenged with risk/reward decisions on whether to purchase shields, weapon upgrades, pet robots to help you out, and smart bombs to clear the arena of foes, etc. Once you take a hit and lose a shield, it’s lost forever unless you buy it back at the upgrade screen. It’s a cleverly implemented system, as your lives are tied to the amount of shields you have.

However, despite its 1980 visual identity, its lightning pace, oodles of enemies, and neat lighting and particle effects on weapon’s fire hint at the modern power underneath.Īs you destroy enemies they drop coins for you to collect, and at the end of each short level this currency can be spent on upgrades for your robot. In fact Ultratron plays heavily on a sense of nostalgia, providing charmingly basic 8 bit geometric enemies, as well as your character, along with recreating the CRT shape and flicker on-screen – with the flicker reserved for the end of level stats screen so not to compromise combat. Meanwhile power-ups randomly appear to enhance your weaponry or aid you with friendly turrets, and fruit travels across the arena, boosting your score and striking a nostalgic tone. Wiping them out is your mandate, with a multiplier kicking in and increasing your score for every enemy you destroy, and lost for every hit you take. You take control of a robot, capable of firing energy weapons in 360 degrees, whilst moving around a small battle arena as waves of enemy robots spawn in and try to gun you down.

Ultratron is a little different, bringing a couple of refreshing tweaks to the formula that makes it a far more accessible shooter for newbies, but one that still delivers on its rewarding challenge for the veterans. The twin-stick shooter genre is a path well-travelled on the Xbox platforms, with these typically highly challenging titles being an alluring game to twitch reaction players and pixel perfect performers, all vying for those hard to achieve achievements and those precious top spots on leaderboards.