A living Christmas village on your walls
Wall Town Wonders isn’t a “Christmas-themed” game — although I fully expect this to be one of the first promised seasonal updates — but it certainly does feel like a Christmas village that came to life. The best part is that you won’t need to install any shelves since all the buildings sit on the wall all by themselves.
In Wall Town Wonders, you’ll be managing a tiny village that resides on the walls of your room. As you’d expect from a village management game, things are a bit more interactive/intimate than you’d expect from a city builder.
While there’s no direct control over the denizens of your town as is the case in a game like Townsmen VR — meaning you can’t pick them up and place them anywhere at any time — there are times when a character will hop on your controller so you can bring them somewhere as part of the game’s story.
You’ll also be directly controlling characters flying planes, riding on the back of miniature (yet giant) lizards, and even combing through mines to dig up ore and other resources. The town simulation isn’t relegated to just putting up buildings by any means; your direct input is what will make your town truly thrive.
Some buildings will automatically bring in resources — the restaurant and some shops bring in gold, while smiths and other crafters will bring in their respective resources — but many important resources are gathered through mini-games that you directly control, as well.
“I found myself marveling at the miniature lives of the folks who frequented my town, getting up close and personal to see what they were up to when walking in and out of rooms that exist somewhere behind the drywall.”
After a little while, you’ll build a tropical pond on your floor, which houses diving contests and fishing tournaments, all of which you’ll play from a giant’s perspective. Berry hunting with the ridable lizards sees the little green guys crawling on your walls while tending to the town’s garden, which sometimes involves shooting bugs that crawl out of imaginary holes in those same walls.
It’s all very fun and imaginative and marks one of the most charming times I’ve yet experienced in any VR or mixed-reality game. I found myself marveling at the miniature lives of the folks who frequented my town, getting up close and personal to see what they were up to when walking in and out of rooms that existed somewhere behind the drywall.
Not only is the placement of objects super convincing but there’s even a way to adjust the lighting to better match your room if you’re really a stickler for realism. Plus, controller and hand-tracking support means you can play this as casually as you want, although I generally found that I preferred controller support for some mini-games.
Not just another zombie shooter in a mall
The Last Stand is the…ahem…last game I’ll cover today, and I’ll keep it mostly brief. That’s not because I didn’t like it at all — quite the contrary. It’s because the game just launched in early access and is best when played in half-hour bouts.
This one is made by the folks behind Drop Dead: The Cabin and the accompanying Home Invasion mixed reality mode. If anything, The Last Stand feels like the full version of what the team was trying to do with Home Invasion, as the game turns your room into a mall store that you’ll need to defend.
The twist is that another human player is on the other side of the mall, and only one person can walk away with the title “survivor.”
“Your real furniture can be used to duck behind and protect yourself from virtual gun fire, and that was just super trippy to me.”
Developer Soul Assembly is currently developing a proper progression game mode, but for now, you can still enjoy defending your store and keeping at the top of the leaderboards, playing rounds with friends or random folks alike.
The concept alone is interesting enough, but I was impressed by how large my tiny 10ftx10ft guest bedroom felt once The Last Stand attached doorways and windows to the walls. People often add ceiling-to-floor mirrors to make rooms feel larger than they are, but this is a next-level room makeover — well, except for the boarded-up windows and invading zombies, of course.
Looking out at a mall-sized room outside my own room was simply surreal, but taking in the sights doesn’t last long as the other player will be shooting at you all while zombies try to consume your brains. Zombie kills equate to cash earned, and the handy tablet you have on your back gets you a quick way to buy better gear and weapons to progress faster.
“I also loved being able to designate one wall as the ‘main’ wall, which would completely change the look and feel of the room. Soul Assembly says that rooms with more furniture in them are best for this game and that immediately made sense when I picked a wall with no furniture against it. Your real furniture can be used to duck behind and protect yourself from virtual gunfire, and that was just super trippy to me.”
I’m really looking forward to seeing proper character progression and some other features built out for this one over time. It’s only a few bucks, though, which makes it easy to pick up without feeling like you got ripped off.
These three games are just a few examples of how good mixed reality gameplay has gotten, and this is just the tip of the iceberg. Many more mixed reality games are coming out before the end of the year, and I expect this class of games will only continue to grow as developers learn how to transform your physical space into new, fun games.
The best part is that you don’t even need the most expensive headset for this since the Meta Quest 3S delivers full-quality mixed-reality gameplay for only 9.
