Mini Review: Akka Arrh (PS4) – A Psychedelic Curiosity from the Past

Akka Arrh is a contemporary re-imagining of a scrapped project dating back to the ‘80s. If that’s not an odd enough set-up to hook you, then maybe the rock-solid gameplay can do it instead. Developed by Llamasoft — the team behind the enigmatic Polybius — Akka Arrh is a unique wave shooter that tasks you with killing enemies across a myriad of colourful levels.

You control a stationary turret with an array of weapons, as wave after wave of enemies try and steal your life pods. The experience is an odd mish-mash of a number of influences. The impact of Tempest feels most overt, with its vibrant vector graphics and combat seeming a major influence, but games like Asteroids or Geometry Wars, or Rez feel equally relevant.

The combat sees you utilize a few different weapons, though the primary is a time-delayed bomb that incorporates rhythm elements. The bombs explode in time to the rhythmic pounding of the electronic score, and this is what allows you to rack up major points, though the insane color palette makes it easy to lose track of things. Enemies create cascades of their own when they die, so if you time your first bomb really well, it’s theoretically possible that you never have to fire again for the remainder of the level. There’s nothing more satisfying than pulling off a massive combo. These combos are important as twitch aiming is not one of the game's strong suits; rotational aiming can be quite sluggish.

Despite that, this is a big area where the title's bizarre sense of humour shines through. The name of your combos gets crazier as they go, eventually losing all coherence and seemingly turning into a string of random words. It’s all amusing and shines a light on just how bizarre this title is.

The core loop is a simple one, but it’s not as instantly addictive as many of the other games from Atari's prime. While it’s satisfying to pull off a huge combo, and requires a surprising degree of strategy, by the time you’ve played through the core 50 levels of the game, you won’t be as anxious to dive back in as you might hope.