HandyGames might not be the most well-known virtual reality (VR) developer but that’s likely to change soon. Having launched a couple of titles in 2017, 2018 has seen the studio hit the ground running with two Steam Early Access releases in February, Townsmen VR and the quirkily titled Devil and the Fairy. The latter certainly grabs the attention, not really revealing too much about what the title is but intriguing none the less. It is in fact a strategy/tower defence videogame that puts you as the monster trying to wipe out waves of annoying heroes.
As with any Early Access videogame the developer is testing the waters, giving you the main core of the title while additional flair and features will be added later on. So currently Devil and the Fairy has three levels to complete, each one consisting of six waves, and three difficulty levels to challenge yourself on.
Supporting both HTC Vive and Oculus Rift (the latter of which VRFocus used) Devil and the Fairy is really easy to get the hang of. As a dark demonic overlord who’s in charge of keeping their magic crystal safe, all your inventory items can be found in your left hand by tilting it palm up. You also have two rings on, one red, one green, with the former giving access to troops while the green ring is for defensive items like barricades or spike traps. These can then be plucked from one hand a placed in one of the highlighted areas.
To begin with your choice of options are fairly limited, with a melee goblin and goblin shaman the only troop choices while defences are the ones already mentioned. The more you play and build experience across any of the maps will unlock more allies to place and defences to help them, such as a healing tower. This does mean that to begin with Devil and the Fairy can feel somewhat repetitious and shallow has you grind those experience points out.
While you may concentrate on planning your strategy and where items are going to be placed don’t forget about exploring the levels. Not only are they really nice to look at and get in close to, they also hide secrets. While merely a secondary feature, the secrets each level hold can help you in battle so they are worth exploring prior to combat. They work much in the same way as a table top VR experience, so you can sit down and move them around with the controllers or stand up for a roomscale experience. You’ll find boxes to smash which will unleash more energy to build troops, or pick those same boxes up and throw them at invaders to stun them for your troops. Later on you may even find other goodies that can be advantageous. It certainly makes each level and run through that bit more involving whilst making the dungeon seem that bit more alive.
If you like a good tower defence videogame and don’t mind Early Access titles then Devil and the Fairy is certainly an interesting choice. With decent visuals, a solid control scheme and some cheeky humour through out, there’s plenty to like. So long as HandyGames continue to add more troops, items and levels then Devil and the Fairy could turn out to be its best VR title yet.
via Mint VR