It’s time for another Oculus Quest review! In case you missed it, you can find a full device review right here and a review of Vader Immortal: A Star Wars VR Series – Episode I over here, but now it’s time to move on to another movie-themed game; Creed: Rise to Glory.
As someone who makes running and going to the gym a big part of her life, I find that one of the most promising avenues for at-home VR could be in the health and fitness sector. Now that I’ve played a good deal of Creed: Rise to Glory, I believe that more than ever.
This probably goes without saying but just in case, Rise to Glory is inspired by the Creed movies starring Michael B. Jordan as Adonis, son of Apollo Creed. The two main modes of play are the solo career mode or the PVP mode where you can fight an opponent you know. And might I suggest not letting someone rope you into duking it out one-on-one before you’ve lightly dabbled in the game? The mechanics are very easy to pick up, but the tutorial offered in career mode is immensely helpful and will give you a quick overview of the skillset needed to hold your own.
In that mode, you’re Adonis gearing up for a big fight. But before you get there, you’re required to do some training and also fight progressively tougher opponents. After walking into the aforementioned PVP fight completely blind, it was wildly impressive how quickly the training gets you up to speed with the different offense and defense tactics and also how naturally you find yourself incorporating them when it time to fight. For anyone who’s played previously released boxing video games on other consoles, you might be familiar with the rather basic “A" to punch, “B” to block style of game play. In Creed: Rise to Glory, however, it’s not that simple and just about everything matters.
The first thing I got hung up on in my matches that makes a ton of sense is the effect of fatigue. The power of your punch matters and so does your accuracy in more ways than one. Yes, you have a better chance of winning because you can more easily defeat your opponent with better strikes, but also because you run the risk of overexerting yourself with poor swings. Plus, when your stamina dips, your punch won’t be as strong anymore. On top of that, as eager as I was to keep on hitting and go for that knockout, defense is key in Rise to Glory. Here, there’s one especially cool feature where if you dodge a punch just right, it triggers a slow motion effect that, one, looks great and, two, gives you the chance to obliterate your opponent. Beyond that, the graphics are solid. The human faces are fairly expressionless and wooden, but everything else is so effective that that winds up being a complete non-issue.
All of this comes together in a way that calls for smart gameplay, smart fighting and smart athletics overall. There’s no button mashing at random as quickly as possible. There’s some serious strategy required here and it mimics real boxing better than any game I’ve ever played before. The training challenges and the thrill of the actual fights are intoxicating.
Odds are, I’m not going to sign up for and drive to a boxing gym to workout on the regular. However, the convenience of the Oculus Quest and Rise to Glory could still make some semblance of the sport a welcomed part of my fitness routine. Between the mechanics of the game, the responsiveness, the all-consuming atmosphere and the freedom that comes with a completely wireless Oculus Quest, Rise to Glory can deliver the thrill of training and fighting in the comfort of your own home and given my current fitness schedule and goals, that’s a very welcomed addition to it.
