First Impressions: Ragnarock (OQ2)

 

Ragnarock

Systems: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, Oculus Quest 2

Release Date: July 15, 2021

Publisher: WanadevStudio

Developer: WanadevStudio 

Ragnarock follows the general format of Guitar Hero and Rock Band in terms of execution when compared to other similar rhythm VR games like Beat Saber.  With Beat Saber, you hit blocks that come flying at you in a specific direction (although there are blocks that you can hit however you want) in time with the music.  In Guitar Hero, you press buttons on a physical fretboard that corresponds to the color of the button that rides along a track at the player in time with the music.  It is actually closer to the drum kit in Rock Band where you hit a specific drum face in time with the drumline as it comes at you on screen.  In Ragnarock, you have four drums out in front of you while beats come racing at you that you hit in time with the music, although the beats do not always correspond to the beat of the drum and will sometimes follow the lead vocals instead or create a counter-rhythm that does not exist in the song and does not feel forced.  The music in Ragnarock is also a lot closer to that of Guitar Hero, being a combination of folk metal, Viking metal, power metal, and pirate metal (more on the metal later), as opposed to the EDM that is part of the default setlist in Beat Saber.  In all of these games, you try to play as accurately as possible to receive as high of a score as possible because all the points matter.  In Ragnarock, because you are in boats, your score is measured in distance traveled and your final score is also sub-ranked by earning bronze, silver, or gold medals, which I believe are there for in-game ranking and further bragging rights.

Before I bought Ragnarock, I was a little worried about trying the game on the Oculus Quest 2 and was surprised that there was not a demo, similar to Beat Saber.  The trailer on the OQ2 does a decent job of showcasing the songs available in the game that are not part of a DLC, but it also comes across as pretty intimidating.

I have never been great at the higher echelons of rhythm games and watching a trailer that seemed to heavily show how fast-paced some of the drumming required was honestly a bit of a turn-off.  But then, as a marketing department, you do not want to show a tutorial stage or someone playing at the easiest setting because that is likely going to be a turn-off to people who focus on rhythm games.

So how does the gameplay?  Very well on the Oculus Quest 2, or at least I think so.  It does not appear as crisp or as smooth as some of Wanadev's trailers but that could just be from the limitations of the hardware.  As far as actual gameplay goes, there are a number of customization options as far as the drums are concerned.  Before you start each stage/song, you can adjust the height of the drums, the angle that your virtual hands hold the virtual drum hammers, the angle of the face of the hammers, the height of your virtual hands, the location of your splash cymbal/shield (which is used to activate your bonus speed boost) and a couple other options.  I have not yet found a sweet spot for all of the customization options as there are times when I feel like the drums might be too low or too high, or that I am too close to the drums and my hammers overshoot the drums causing me to miss a beat which resets your boost meter.

The music is really where a lot of the fun is at.  All of the genres of metal mentioned above are sub-genres of metal that I regularly listen to, although apart from Alestorm, Gloryhammer, and NanowaR of Steel, I had not heard of any of the other bands so 25 of the 32 tracks were new to me.  Because I speak English and have an unintentional English-centric view, I was surprised by how many of the songs in the game are not sung in English, which really should not have surprised me as much as it did because there are several bands I listen to that do not sing in English (Arkona, Moonsorrow, Dalriada, some Eluveitie).  I guess it was nice to not think that someone in the marketing department demanded that all of the songs be in English in order to reach and maintain a larger audience.  Naturally, there were songs from bands that I was surprised that were not included, mainly Amon Amarth and Korpiklaani and I could only speculate about record labels and the cost to license songs?  I honestly do not know.

There is the option, even on the Oculus Quest 2 to add your own custom songs, although even the developer's website is not 100% clear on that process as it is not as easy as uploading MP3 files to a folder within the game files on the OQ2.  I have also found two sites, Ragnasong and Ragnacustoms that have a lot of songs to download but I have not had luck pulling songs from Ragnacustoms and I have not had a chance to upload the ones from Rangasongs to find out how well people have their own beat-maps.  I am a little worried that some songs just might be beyond my ability to play and enjoy.  Presently, I feel like I am going to play the lower level songs and dabble in the harder difficulties 

Each song has a sliding difficulty scale, although where each song is on that difficulty scale varies between songs.  For instance, "Welcome to Asgard" by Manaberry, has difficulty ratings of 1, 4, and 6, while "Valhalleluja" by NanowaR of Steel has difficulty ratings of 4, 6, and 8.  I have also noticed that the structure of the beats you play changes between difficulties as well, as I have found that I like the placement of the beats in "Loki" on 2 rather than 4, not because it is more difficult, but because of how the beats fall leading up to and in the chorus feels more intuitive and just has better energy.  And with the songs being easier on the lower difficulties, I personally find it easier to enjoy the songs rather than stressing out on missing beats and thereby having a boost reset.

There is a multiplayer mode and I have played a few rounds which have been quite a lot of fun.  The game is the same with the only difference being that the lanes your ship is in is wider to accommodate up to six total players and you can see where your competitors are and how far ahead of you they are.  Each person puts in their choice for a song at the end of each race that the game randomly chooses.  I am not 100% clear on how the difficulty is chosen or if it is only from songs that you have played and earned medals on, but so far I have not gone up against someone who is choosing to play a song at an unplayable difficulty.

Lastly, despite the fact that you are on a ship that is moving horizontally, I have felt zero motion sickness.  It could be that you are focused on hitting objects in front of you that is where your visual focus is at and so even when you do look off to the side or in front of you and see visual movement that your brain does not try to mess up your inner ear by convincing you that you are moving.  So at least for me, I have been very comfortable playing for 30-45 minutes at a time.  

Ragnarock does make me smile a lot when I am playing and there are times I have to consciously tell myself not to get too into the songs or the OQ2 headset could fall off my face and that would be bad.  I look forward to improving in my skill in the game, which will hopefully further increase my enjoyment in some of the harder difficulty stages, but even if I do not improve to the 8 - 10 stages, I know that even the 1-4 are still a lot of fun.  I am also looking forward to new music that seems to be released two songs (or so) at a time every three to four months and I am sure at some point there will be the option of paid DLC and then of course, there is the experimenting with the custom songs which I may end up doing its own article on.  But for the time being, Ragnarock is definitely my brand of VR rhythm game.

~JWfW/JDub/The Faceplantman/Jaconian
So Let These Murky Waters Take Me Home