There are few players who were on the gaming scene in the early 2000s that don’t remember Geometry Wars. A simple but effective idea, Bizarre Creations really just threw this addicting concept into Project Gotham Racing as an easter egg, and the subsequent releases of this twin stick arena survivor with basic shapes as icons was an explosive success. The problem is that “geometry” and “triangles” aren’t exactly copyrightable ideas, and so developers starting churning out a series of titles that relied on wireframes to do the heavy lifting. This title, Geometry Survivor, is exactly what you’d imagine: a mashup of geometric figures and Vampire Survivors. The results? It’s definitely a game.

If you’ve spent any time with Vampire Survivors, Brotato, 20 Minutes Till Dawn or any single stick survival arena game, you know the gist. Walk around, kill things and don’t die. Geometry Survivor has no direct aiming capabilities, though several weapons (the Fat Beam, the Slingshot) use your movement to calibrate where the damage will go. Get enough blue things and you evolve, gaining more powers, and collect yellow things as “credits” to buy passive, permanent upgrades between levels.

You can also buy different ships to utilize their own powers, and I think any players looking for longevity needs to carefully example this catalog more than the basic “% increase in speed/damage” minimal upgrades. You’ve got a ship that allows for more weapons but no evolutions (powerup, yes, just no fancy final form), a ship that makes the whole game move a whopping 30% faster, and a ship that just chooses upgrades for you instead of giving you choices. I personally wish I could combine the latter two ships into something that would give me an immediate speed boost, because 20 minutes doesn’t sound like a lot till you realize you’re just doing donuts in space.

There’s good and bad aspects of Geometry Survivor (shocking, I know). On the plus side, the visuals of the game are on par and sharp with the other Geometry games from which it pulls influence. You’ll never confuse your ship with any of the colorful enemies, who have a variety of attack patterns and defensive maneuvers. The only confusion came from a weapon in which you drop a bomb behind you, and the bomb does sort of look like a red enemy that, surprise, also explodes. I think it gets better once the bomb evolves, as it turns into a pulsing green entity that’s easier to spot.

Also, though repetitive, the soundtrack is both exciting and essential. Though the loop of the electronic discord is a bit tiresome, being able to listen to visual cues for your weapons is a godsent in terms of strategy. There’s distinct tones for when you’re about to drop a bomb, or when your Fat Beam is charged, or, most essentially, when the temporary shield powerup is about to kick back online. This level of timing is the difference between wasting a weapon upgrade or not: if the shield is a moment away from naturally recharging, you can upgrade it later and work on some of the firepower instead.

The weapon variety is decent, and I have to hand it to Geometry Survivor for giving a wide swath of approaches. Some, like the ally ship, are excellent for helping with earlier waves, but a bit more useless later in the game. Others, like the boomerang or the sniper, feel a bit underwhelming in the first phase but become sweepers by the time they’re fully evolved. I like to pretend that I had some kind of strategy, but there wasn’t anything to it: get the drop bombs, the spiral shot and the shield and you’re set as long as you keep moving. Which, tragically, is all you need to do for Geometry Survivor.

One thing that really works for Vampire Survivor and its companions is finding some kind of incentive to keep going. Vampire Survivor has so much built into it in terms of areas, secrets, additional characters and fusions, and that’s even before the bonkers DLC. Being able to have a goalpost, however ephemeral, is critical to a game like this’ longevity. I just want to keep going till I can unlock this, or try that, or do this other thing, or some minor target that makes you willing to dive back in.

For Geometry Survivor, though, that moment of success comes relatively quickly and passes in the same breath. Without any sort of massive customization, each run is the same in essence. You learn to anticipate the waves as soon as you can hit the finish line once, and the different ships have some minor modifications, but no real versatility or variety in actual interaction. The passive upgrades only incrementally change the game, asking you to invest a gargantuan amount of credits in order to feel any distinct change, and even then it’s mostly placebo. It’s a single stick survival game, and you get the gist within the first ten minutes.

For some, this could be a serious boon in terms of engagement and execution. Goodness knows the sheer fluctuation of arrangements that came from 20 Minutes Till Dawn resulted in me having favorites and ignoring a good amount of the game’s additional details because, well, I like what I like. Here, there’s no real choice other than if you want to be a triangle, a hexagon, a sort of concentric circle pattern or none of the above. The “challenge” ship that strips you down to a single heart feels like an obvious addition that is, nonetheless, appreciated, but that doesn’t make it less predictable. An unlockable that’s just a trophy to show off that you can waste credits? I don’t feel like I can process this game properly to allow it that level of attitude.

Also, if you’re going to go toe-to-toe with other one stick titles, you need to have polished execution. In every playthrough, my game began to stutter and freeze in the last seven minutes or so. The world would just suddenly freeze for a moment or two, and then get unstuck and move forward like nothing happened. This occurs more and more, building ire and stress as you get closer to the finale, concerned that the Switch’s hiccupping will be the death of you. I can’t compare the PC edition, so I don’t know if this is solely a Switch issue, but it still kills me that this handheld console is now beginning its ninth year on the market and developers still can’t be bothered to iron out the wrinkles.

In the end, Geometry Survivor is a rather simple title that could go one of two ways. Either it stays the way it is and just fades into obscurity, or it continues to build and becomes something great. The potential is there: the groundwork has been laid and the concept is solid. But there needs to be more in terms of every direction, from more areas to more weapons and more excitement. Make some fake achievements, create a daily scoreboard, add a massive time speedup, just do SOMETHING so this isn’t as small and shallow as a cloudburst puddle. Otherwise, it’ll evaporate just as soon.

Graphics: 6.5 While rather run of the mill in terms of enemies and bullets, I did appreciate the personalized touches on some attacks and the different ship patterns. Black background helps neon shapes pop.	Gameplay: 5.0 Single stick survivor with upgrades and passive attacking. You can figure it out in six seconds and it doesn’t exactly innovate on any fronts. Really could have used a touch of something to make it more unique, but it does what it does competently.
Sound: 6.0 Music is repetitive and the same track is used over and over, but it suits the atmosphere and the mood nicely. Sound effects helped to give me hope and cues when playing, so that’s clever in utilization.	Fun Factor: 4.0 There are, sadly, several games just like this that I would rather be playing, and they’re also on my Switch: doubly bad luck for Geometry Survivor. It’s fun for a moment, but when it’s over, there’s no incentive to come back.
Final Verdict: 5

Geometry Survivor is available now on Nintendo Switch, Playstation 4/5, Xbox Series One X/S and PC.

Reviewed on Nintendo Switch.

A copy of Geometry Survivor was provided by the publisher.