Don’t get Hitman GO for Oculus Rift if you already own it

Fair game for newcomers though

The era of VR exclusivity has begun, and it’s just as I feared. Not only are consumers expected to have a VR-ready PC, but they also have to deal with platform fragmentation. Case and point — Hitman Go: VR Edition, a fabulous port of an already great puzzle game, is exclusive to the Oculus family.

That means that Steam and HTC Vive owners, even existing ones, are not getting it anytime soon, despite the fact that they also technically own it on PC, and that the headsets are ostensibly the same. Of course that could change, especially if Oculus software sales go the way of the Ouya, but for now, it’s a reality.

What more can be said about GO that we haven’t already? Bucking its 3D action roots, GO is more chess than carnage, taking place on a fixed track with board game pieces. The advantage of the VR Edition over any other is minimal, and is mostly predicated on the sheer joy of being able to look down on the field like a tabletop game. The only real “feature” is the power to manipulate the level itself, which is easily triggered with the use of the right analog stick.

The ability to bend the camera to your will (and move the entire stage, if you so choose) should alleviate pretty much any perspective issues you may have with Hitman GO. Said shifting is even accompanied by a satisfying noise of rattling, like you’re moving the pieces around manually in your own home. Having the level marker on the border of each board is also a nice touch, so you don’t lose track of the “default” camera view should you get lost. Simply looking up will queue the restart or quit options — the load times are basically instantaneous.

Hitman Go: VR Edition is a hard sell if you own the original, but since the entire [great] core experience is preserved with a non-obtrusive new view, now is probably the time to get in on the series if you already bought a headset.