What the Bat replaces your arms and hands with a pair of baseball bats, and has you swinging through a series of short but sweet levels in an attempt to live a normal life. It's madness, but works wonderfully. This PSVR2 curio makes solid use of the hardware to deliver one of its silliest yet most appealing launch games.
Playing is so intuitive; all you need to do is move your arms, often taking a swing at whatever object happens to be near you. With not a single button press required, and practically flawless tracking on the PSVR2 Sense Controllers, the game is perfect for VR beginners. We did run into one or two collision issues, but resetting by holding down Options quickly fixed that.
The levels are micro-challenges or puzzles, and there are many of them within each theme. You'll start off just smacking baseballs at trophies (often the target of each level), but will then progress through a pseudo-life story. As a child, you'll put shapes into matching slots and fire bananas at toast, and as you grow up, you'll learn to brush your teeth and do the laundry with your bat appendages. With an elephant companion always nearby, it's surreal at times but consistently amusing. The haptic feedback makes interacting with the world feel great, too.
Each stage offers up some new idea or gameplay mechanic, keeping the game fresh throughout its short runtime. It's not just hitting things into the distance — you'll go bowling, play fetch with your dog, light a campfire, work at a supermarket, visit a museum, and much more. These bite-sized levels keep the novelty going, as you're compelled to find out where the heck the game will take you next.
You will need some space to play; the game requires a roomscale environment, owing to all the arm-swinging. You won't need to move from your standing position, so the requirement feels a touch restrictive. Still, if you're able to meet the necessary floorspace, What the Bat is a very silly but entertaining PSVR2 title. While short, the good news is that more content is on the way, so there's even more madness to enjoy beyond launch.
Comments 18
I'm always glad to hear in reviews if games really play the styles the store says. I didn't notice in the store this is room scale, and that's immediately a no-go for me, just not enough open space to play anything room scale.
I just checked, cause the roomscale thing kept me from buying the game at launch (don't have that large of a play area...also too many games to play anyway lol). The What the Bat Twitter account stated on Feb 21st that the game is now playable in stationary mode and will be updated in the first patch. Guessing that patch hasn't rolled in yet?
I guess I'll pick it up when there's more to it then
@NEStalgia @Jayslow Yeah, so to elaborate on this a little more. You can totally play this game just standing in one spot, you don't actually need a large space — just enough so you can move your arms around. I thought the Roomscale requirement was a bit odd in that sense. The only time I really had to move was in a couple of levels that want you to duck down.
Hopefully the patch comes soon and lets you play in the Standing mode, because Roomscale isn't entirely necessary.
@NEStalgia
All “room scale” seems to be is a way to prevent lawsuits (My “room scale” actually passes past my sofa to an area I could never reach, which is fine for hands of course, but not feet), I’m sure they’d be scared I’d bump into it.
As the review said you don’t need to move from one spot this isn’t really a room scale requirement. Just need enough space above waist height to swing your arms.
@Voltan
I don’t think there will ever be that much more to it. That’s why it’s cheap.
@thefourfoldroot1 Even if it's not much, I'd rather play a short game than an even shorter one that gets a few more minutes every once in a while. I did play What The Golf so I have a general idea what to expect here
This game was fun for what it is, even if it was a little basic for me. I’m really having a hard time trusting the VR reviews on this site though when something like this reviews higher than Star Wars Tales from the Galaxy’s Edge and got the same score as Horizon Call of the Mountain. I suppose the budget price can be considered, but even so this game regularly retails at $24.99. Half the price of Star Wars for probably less than 1/4 of the amount of content.
@Darthmoogle
Could be worse, UPLOADVR gave this 2022 game of the year! Lol
We all know opinions vary, but I can generally add 1 or even 2 points to every score Pushsquare gives.
Wondering what they will give GR7.
I bought this game bc I loved What the Golf and the humor/gameplay on that one. This game is a bit more "barebones" compared to What the Golf, but as a VR experience I think it lives up to my expectation. I had alot of fun with this game and I'm looking forward to more content.
@thefourfoldroot1 @Quintumply Thanks, that's good info! If it's really going to be patched then it might be worth trying. As-is, I can't even get the roomscale to let me play because it just can't scan a good enough area, so I'm just avoiding anything roomscale. This and the bartender game, and a few others.
It seems like devs are kind of messing up with the sit/stand/room thing on the PS Store. Pavlov says sitting is supported. There's no toggle in the settings and if you're sitting it thinks you're crouching, you're waist-high to other characters, and you move at half speed....clearly sitting is NOT supported, but it says it is in the store. Not the end of the world, I'm too lazy to stand most of the time but I have a growing game collection that either needs it or is just problematic when sitting without ruining the couch springs, lol. But still frustrating that you can't go by what it says on the store.
@neonpizza "flat HDR look?"
IDK, I thought 70-75% or so is the ideal for dynamic contrast (over 75% the highlights get blown out, full bright shouldn't be the default, it's just bad calibration.) anything 0 brightness with bright scenes is what looks flat and over-contrasty (crushed blacks) to me. Anything under half looks "wrong" in the highlights. HOWEVER, I did notice that Moss 1, when in the library cathedral AT NIGHT, actually looks best at brightness 0 or 1, anything else is like setting the contrast wrong on a regular TV and shadows are too bright. But then you go back to daytime and anything under half looks wrong again.
IDK if it's my eyes adapting to the headset, if it's just getting better at finding the sweet spot, or if the screens need time to burn in, but I'm finding my headset is more clear overall than it was the first week. A lot of the fuzz and issues I used to have jsut look clear and stable now. Might be the screen settling. Or might be me.
I did discover an IPD issue I hadn't realized. SOMETHING about the IPD tracking keeps thinking I have a lazy eye pointing a different direction than my other eye, and I didn't realize for a while that it means foveated rendering doesn't work right, since it can not realize where I'm looking. I've taken to using the IPD screen when I put it on since it tracks my eye better, and I've also taken to closing my one eye and adjusting the IPD using just one eye.....just turning the wheel while looking through one eye, I noticed it dramatically affects clarity in that eye, so I just adjust until that one eye (not sure if its my strong or weak eye) is really where I get the clearest image. That, and not crushing my head.
@NEStalgia
I always play seated unless I’m playing pistol Whip, just with the “room scale” setting enabled to stop the bloody red circles. I find that, if for whatever reason you want to change your height, you just momentarily stand and reset on the controller then sit down again.
I do know what you mean about the headset looking better after a few days. I too don’t know whether it’s just me managing my own expectations better, being better at finding the sweet spot, or some other reason, but I went back into Horizon after a couple of days and it did just seem to look so much better. It was very strange. I figured I just hit the sweet spot better (which can be more difficult with my glasses I imagine) but the improvement has persisted now.
I also noticed the lazy eye thing by the way. My right eye seemed to be misaligned in comparison to the other. But then I had an eye test recently, and I do have astigmatism in my right eye. 175 degree or something, not sure what that means. Might we be getting an eye test from Sony? Lol I’ll have to experiment with what you said.
@neonpizza Yeah there's a lot of bad HDR implementations out there. Overall I think MOST things look far better in HDR than SDR, but, I do agree the milky gamma settings are tremendously just bad in a lot of implementations. Of course I don't have an OLED so the issues aren't nearly as pronounced, but gamma issues absolutely irritate me.
With brightness, it's not even about the motion issues (I think a lot of people don't notice the motion issues, overall anyway) but even that aside, 100% brightness is just wrong. I liken it to "Vivid" mode for TVs. It exists so that when you demo it in a store it's so bright and colorful and people think "wow, look at how amazing this screen is!" and then you take it home and realize it all looks like garbage because the contrast and colors are wrong. Not only does 100% bring out the motion/mura issues more than is needed, but it just blows out highlights, strains the eyes, ruins the shadows, and just is not correct calibration for natural images (except making sunlight look like real sunlight which is debatably not actually a good thing...) I think 50-75% is really the correct range for "natural" images in terms of contrast, shadows, highlight detail preservation, etc. (You can see in, for example HCOTM, from 75-100% texture detail actually vanishes into the highlights, and you see a lot more detail at 75% and below.) Full brightness, motion issues aside, hides details! So the "good" news is the worst of the motion problems should never even be a problem because nobody should actually use that brightness anyway because it's also worse IQ overall. It's just too bright.
But yeah, I haven't seen anything at 0% or even 1% that doesn't crush blacks hopelessly. It's a good motion test, but it's so dim with so much lost shadow detail it's not totally usable, IMO. I can imagine RE8 would have absurd shadow loss.
That's the thing, I DON'T actually have a lazy eye. But for some reason the IPD calibration THINKS I do, much of the time. IDK why. Not sure how it works, but something about it thinks the one eye points the wrong way (it doesn't actually do that.) And it doesn't ALWAYS think that. If I pull the visor out it seems to get it right then as I close it in it either keeps it right, or then thinks the eye direction moved. I'm sure it's something about my eye shape, astygmatism, or something, but it's weird. It's not a show stopper now that I know it happens, it just means I have to make it a point to check the IPD screen whenever using a foveated game, because if I don't make sure it registers things right it could be blurring randomly what direction it THINKS my eye is looking even though I'm not looking there. Sometimes I felt weird playing foveated games where it felt like one eye was just blurry or "felt weird", and finaly I realized that eye was horribly out of focus,and then realized it was IPD related/foveation related. Just takes an extra 30 seconds of setup really to jiggle it until it registers correctly. I don't think it's a hardware issue specifically, I think it's just an anatomy conflicting with hardware guestimation a little.
@thefourfoldroot1 Haha, I'm glad it's not just me with the IPD googly eye thing! I do also have an astygmatism, so that must be somehow throwing it off, but you'd think the tracking would be able to figure out where you're really looking with however it works. I don't actually remember which eye is my strong one, tbh, I get a new scrip like once a decade or so....and it hasn't really changed much so I mostly don't bother. Irritating to tweak in the VR kit, though that's probably something they can improve in software later.
Cool tip about standing up for a second and centering. I never thought of that, I'll have to try!
@neonpizza
I’ve just pushed the play area far enough out manually that it’s is considered a room scale setting. Doesn’t matter if there are chairs, tables, etc in the way (not sure about walls). Kept the line before the TV just to be safe. Now I never get the red circles. Always tell the system I’m playing standing, then just use the realignment button on the controller when I’m sitting to put the headset at “head height”. I never actually use a seated option when I first set it up every play session otherwise I get those red warning marks (which you can also adjust in settings by the way, to make them come up later, but I’d recommend just inventing a larger play area if it’s safe). The seatings settings are far too restrictive.
Regarding the things you want. I don’t care at all about compression heavy wireless connections. Most compression is too much for me even with wired connection to a PC with things like quest.
Don’t care about how slim the visor looks.
I find the tracking perfect so far, but I have small spotlights on a low ceiling (another reason I always play seated).
But a screen with less motion blur (if that is the issue), a larger sweet spot, and a diopter adjustment so I wouldn’t have to buy prescription inserts would be great. In built Audio perhaps too. And a slightly higher res passthrough camera so I can read my phone.
All quite small things in the scheme of it though.
@NEStalgia
Did I say up? I meant down, lol. Although guess it depends on where you want to re-centre.
@neonpizza Wireless won't happen without a dongle, no Miracast or anything built in...4k video wireless realtime is still so, sooooo bad....but I'm still not sure we really want that. Especially with your high sensitivity to motion issues and the like, wireless is going to cause you so much pain. Even when it works, there's all the radio interferance issues (My DS5's lose connection often enough if I just drop the controller on the other side of the arm chair between it and the PS5 which is like 5 feet away. I don't want to think of 4k video with that same setup!)
I've actually become thankful for the ringed controllers. Saved me doing some damage to my hand a few times when I wack my steel monitor pole. My controller has some black scuffs to prove it
FYI, this was patched recently to remove the Roomscale requirement.
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