As many of you know, I didn't own a PS2 until 2004 (or a Dreamcast ever) so I have never experienced this weird little game that everyone raves about. The screenshots and videos I looked up when this port was announced were some of the most bizarre things I'd seen, depicting some flying dude in trippy environment. Also boxes. So I was going into this version of the game with no previous bias or nostalgia.

I only had a few hours to spend with Rez HD today, but it was enough to know that I like it. The object is to move your cursor over everything while alternately holding and releasing "A". You lose life when anything hits you, so just move your cursor over them before they hit you and you're golden. Even just one hit will fuck you, but it's really quite easy to avoid being hit at all if you watch carefully. It's a game only in the most basic sense of the word, and I breezed through the first 2 areas with no trouble at all, eventually dying at the hands of the third boss. I understand that there's only 5 levels, and I finished the first 3 in about an hour, but it certainly seems like re-playing levels will be just as fun each time.

This is very much one of those games you'll either love or be bored with, and which one depends on how much you weigh gameplay versus the overall experience. And Rez is quite a unique experience. It's every bit the Aural/Visual orgasm you've heard about, and the use of additional controllers for vibration surprisingly adds as much to the experience as it does to low-brow comedy potential. And while the experience is certainly a sensory overload, I found it much easier on the eyes than Space Giraffe.

I'll see if my opinions change after I finish the last levels and spend some more time with the game. I do like that there's a mode where you don't take any damage, so maybe I'll be able to get a non-gaming girlfriend's reactions as well.

Definitely give the trial a shot, though. I think it deserves a good bit of the hype it's gotten.