Experience parkour heroics, without ever having to move your feet.

Run, swing, and shoot your way across a vast metropolis, in this follow-up to virtual reality (VR) parkour game Stride (2021).

Stride: Fates, puts you in the virtual shoes of a “chaser,” a police officer of sorts with augments that make you even more valuable to the “SkyChasers” – the police of Airon City.

The game developed by Joy Way, was originally released for the Meta Quest series of headsets Nov. 9, 2023, and has now been ported over to the PlayStation VR2 (PSVR2) and Steam. It is set to release tomorrow (May. 16, 2024) on both platforms.

What was originally set to be DLC for the original stride – a game had no real story and was essentially created to let you experience Mirror’s Edge in VR – ended up becoming a sequel, with story being top of mind. However, the story here seems to be more of an overall thread that ties things together, rather than something to keep you engaged.

This is not a bad thing, as the core principle of Fates is still to run, jump and shoot as you make your way around the city. But those looking for a story to envelop you as you crash through windows and hack your way across cyberspace, may feel slightly disappointed.

You’re the saviour for Airon City, and your technological implants – essentially you can slow down time to react faster – help you kill everyone around you with more precision.

As you make your way through the dozen or so levels, you’re met with various puzzles and challenges as you work to prevent the seedy criminals from doing whatever it is they’re doing.

It’s a fun experience if you aren’t a baby who plays VR games with teleportation movement. But there are some issues that the pre-launch version had – and hopefully will be fixed by time the game is ready.

To start, the game is touted by the developers as a graphical improvement for PSVR2 and Steam, running at 90 frames per second – compared to the 72 on Quest. While it definitely looks decent, it’s no Red Matter 2, with things not looking as crisp as they could be.

The game is NOT ugly by any means, it just doesn’t impress visually in the same way the trailer does.

Airon City is vast and you’ll traverse many locales including rooftops, basements, slums and more, and you do get to feel the atmosphere as you make your way through each.

One issue that seems rather odd is your guns cannot be placed back on a holster. During the initial “tutorial” level you’re thrown into a mini game of sorts that gives you the first chance at action.

Firstly, the notification that your gun is on a chest holster is not very evident – it actually took a minute to realize it was there (thanks bright green box, for being super deceptive). Once the gun is found though, you’re thrown into a fray of dealing with the computer generated baddies – at this point you’re in “cyberspace” during a hacking mission.

Anyways, once you take your gun off the holster, it very strangely cannot be put back once you’re done with it. Instead, trying to put it back will end up seeing it drop to the ground before magically appearing back on you – although you cannot see it.

Perhaps this was just a pre-launch bug, but it’s strange that you couldn’t snap your pistol back onto your chest. Thankfully, the VR world of Fates has magical magnets, otherwise you would be screwed as you make your way through a level, sans gun.

To note: you do get more guns that strap to your back as you play, and all guns can be upgraded if you find the upgrade packs throughout the city. These add things like improved sights, extended magazines and more. Considering that the gunplay just doesn’t feel as precise as it could be, these upgrades become almost necessary.

In fact, the first level will probably be the most infuriating for people who have aim that can be categorized as decent or above; you can be perfectly aiming down the sight and still miss your mark just a few feet away.

Climbing is a big part of the traversal here and sometimes when you’re scaling a building, the grabbing just doesn’t want to work.

It only really happened a few times – and on specific types of climbable materials (damn you weird building scaffolding) – but it was enough that it kind of felt dissatisfying.

As you make your way through the game, your enemies are plenty. The good news, they’re not very bright.

The majority of the dummies you have to kill are all the same, but you’ll find a few that have more tech or abilities that make them “formidable” and force you to use your skills to get around them.

One thing to note: it’s probably going to take some time to get use to the mechanics of this game.

Movement is pretty basic with the left controller stick being used to move and the ‘X’ button being used to jump. Turning is done the usual way – the right controller stick. However, running requires the added movement of swinging your arms, and jumping higher means throwing your arms above your head.

It seems easy right?

But, add in need to put all this together with shooting, climbing and swinging – you’re equipped with a grappling hook on your wrist that helps grab items and connect to drones that are conveniently flying about – and it’s going to take some mastery.

Herein lies the replayability.

As you get better at movement, the game becomes more fun. You’ll start to look at how you can move across the city in different ways – it is open-world after all – and it’s here where you get to feel like an action movie hero.

Overall, the game does what it intends – you get to experience the freedom of parkour from the safety of VR.

Despite some shortcomings that are evident in the pre-launch version, it’s still an immensely fun game, with mechanics that test the bounds of what a great VR game can have.

At USD$29.99 – probably coming in around 39.99 in Canada – the price is not bad for what you get, considering DLC is free.

Developer Joy Way notes that the Steam version of the game comes with two different DLCs included – as does the Quest version when it released, but that game also included mixed reality.

The PSVR2 version only comes with one on launch, but Alexandra Prakhova, community manager with Joy Way, notes that the second DLC was developed concurrently with the PSVR2 release, and would come a few months after the game launches.

If you want an action game that takes you on a heroic adventure, Stride: Fates may be worth your time.

Stride: Fates was reviewed after receiving a complimentary copy from the development team.