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Shred Nebula Review - Xbox 360

Introduction

As Xbox Live's fantastic Bionic Commando and Castle Crashers have recently shown us, engaging gameplay is still the most important ingredient in a game's mix. Shred Nebula is a new addition; a top-down shooter with a dash of adventure thrown in. Released to little fanfare, Shred Nebula aims to capture the magic of old-school classics like Asteroids. Saddle up for light speed as we go along for the ride. Punch it, Chewie.

Gameplay

As the new pilot of the RIP Rocket, you are sent into space to track down the missing Algoran Exploration fleet – a number of ships that have mysteriously disappeared over many years. The campaign has you working your way through the galaxy in just over twenty missions. Each mission has you searching for a beacon to scan that will then teleport you to the next location, eventually culminating in a boss battle.

Shred Nebula has quite an interesting control scheme that does take some getting used to. Steering your ship is controlled by the left thumbstick, while the left bumper and trigger thrusts you forward or back. It takes you a little time to get your head around just movement- then you add in the bevy of weapon and shield commands and you’ve got yourself quite a complex setup. I never felt totally comfortable with the controls, and when there were many enemy ships attacking it lead to moments of controller-throwing frustration.

Initially armed with a just a single shot, your arsenal can be upgraded as you progress. Various shields, bombs, and weapon multipliers can be collected to make life that little bit easier. Each of the eight ships in the game has a strength and weakness, and even though the difference between them all is minor, you’re still likely to find that some suit your playing style better than others. Unfortunately, you have little control over the upgrades to your ship – it would have been nice to choose which areas of your ship you wanted to upgrade.

The sheer lack of variety across the missions, in terms of enemy and level design, is the defining thing that sinks the campaign mode. After half a dozen missions of doing the same thing, the magic wears off. As you progress you’ll discover that the story is pretty basic; there’s no real explanation for the disappearances or any real motive behind it all. Plus, the boss battles themselves are pretty pathetic. Most are dispatched in the same manner, which vastly cheapens the experience of taking them down.

As a result, Shred Nebula’s campaign doesn’t really hook you like it could, and indeed should have. The campaign can be clocked in under an hour and a half if you forgo destroying all the enemies, earning you one of the game’s achievements. That being said, the game does impress on occasions. In the later levels, enemy fighters swarm wave after wave towards your ship. When you reverse to focus on a ...

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