Hands On: Star Child By Playful Is A VR Game To Be Looking Forward To

We just had the pleasure of getting our first hands-on demo of Playful’s upcoming game called Star Child on PlayStation VR, and my oh my did we have some fun. In this upcoming title, you’ll be guiding a female character through various sorts of environments while facing all sorts of danger.

Star Child will let you control the main female protagonist who looks to be on an adventure to find something dear to her. While we don’t quite yet know the full storyline, the short demo provided us with certain understanding of what Playful’s trying to achieve. “Star-Child is more of a mystery, explained Paul Bettner, CEO of Playful Corp. “But we don’t want to give away too much, too soon.”

One of the first unique points you’ll notice about Star Child is their ability to bring side-scrolling to VR. Now, you might be thinking that side-scrolling is unfeasible or inefficient in the VR space but let me assure you that Playful Corp. has managed to pull this off with great style.

In the game, you are only given the option to go left or right which might feel limiting at the beginning. But as the story unfolds you’ll notice that this becomes the crutch to the whole game and concept. Most VR games are quite distracting in the idea of freedom, pace, and chaos. But with limited direction in Star Child, you are able to focus on the things that matter which is the storytelling component. “[Star Child] feels like a stage in front of you,” said Bettner. “A cinematic side-scroller.”

You can move closer or further away from the character to catch all of the details that Playful has built into Star Child. As you run through the grass, you can see it light up in warm neon colors. Or as you jump over large pillars, you can turn your head sideways to see the subtle details they’ve added into the character’s movement.

While there was only around 5 to 8 minutes of gameplay we got to see a unique point of concept and how the virtual reality platform can be used in an untraditional way. We’re looking forward to seeing the development of Star Child and how it’ll bring new ideas to the growing platform.