Hoop Route Reviews

Hoop Route is a VR exclusive "reflexes" "game", and I put "game" in quotes because this barely counts as a game. You know those toy distractions for preschoolers where they have to pass a ring along a twisted wire without touching it? That's what this is... a (badly) recreated preschoolers activity set. That the developer wants money for. From a technical perspective, the game doesn't meet basic minimum requirements that most PC gamers expect as standard. The game features lazy minimalist/untextured low-polygon "retro" assets and visuals, making this look like a barely functional 3D game from the early 1990s. The lack of textures is a method that lazy devs often use to disguise their lack of talent/interest in doing the graphics properly and trying to disguise it under the name of "art", or "We made it look bad on purpose", which really isn't something gamers should have to put up with. It's unclear why the developers weren't willing to arrange high quality, high polygon count contemporary assets and high resolution textures for the game. It looks bad as a result of their decisions, and that's just another reason to avoid it. This seems to have been made a VR exclusive to prevent any comparison with non-VR 3D games, a comparison that this game would fail very badly at. Developers must learn that while VR is great, if the only thing that makes the game great is the VR, then the game isn't great at all. These technical defects push this game below acceptable standards for any modern PC game. The poor quality of this game is reflected by how many people spent time with it. At the time of this review, SteamDB shows the all-time peak player number was only 3 players. This is a remarkably low number, and now, the only player activity occurs once or twice a month, presumably someone loading it up to see what it is then quickly uninstalling it. Considering there's over 120 million gamers on Steam and well over 50,000 games for gamers to choose from (over 9,000 completely free titles), the overwhelming lack of interest in this low quality game is to be expected. Hoop Route is relatively cheap at $1 USD, but it's not worth it. Given the defects and quality issues with the game, coupled with the unrealistic price, this is impossible to recommend.

Now this game is the ultimate test of patience. One needs the willingness to try a level over and over and over and over again. I never finished the second level; it was so frustrating. Ideas for improvement: -easier earlier levels (could easily just double/triple the number of save points; I think that's something simple to implement that would make a huge difference) -allow for more tolerance before starting over (half the time it didn't even look like I touched the edges; it's too finicky) -add in a menu option somewhere (either in game, or for the whole safe file) for an easier mode (e.g. reduce thickness of the ring) -background music I love a good challenging game, but I think this is a little too much (especially for the beginner levels). If the first couple levels are too frustrating for people to finish, and you cannot unlock later levels without doing earlier ones... people will miss out on most of your game. I want to see all the hard work put into this game and to explore the other levels! Summary: I'm just not a patient person. If you have no other games to play, then feel free to try this out and play the same level a million times..

This game is so hard. Very challenging, but in a fair way. Works on Oculus Rift with Touch. Do need roomscale setup. Sale Price Rating 7/10. Good deal for $1.49; Normal Price Rating 5/10. Note: there are 2 free games on Steam VR that are very similar but this one has the most polish IMHO