FRUIT NINJA VR

Coconut kibosher is one bad apple

This slice of papaya-pummelling action may be the least complicated game I’ve ever played. And y’know what? That’s not entirely a complaint. Yes, this is a onenote experience that’ll have greengrocers across the land wincing, but at least it does feature the most satisfying berry-butchering you’ll ever witness.

Fruit Ninja VR first started out life on mobile devices, and the seed-stuffed core of the initial finger-tapping action translates seamlessly onto PlayStation VR. Of course, hitting your phone or PS Vita’s screen with smudgy digits to duff up fruit can’t match the accuracy of dicing watermelons with a pair of PS Move controllers. Thanks to spot-on motion tracking, destroying some farmer’s juicy produce with a pair of onscreen blades is a doddle. Really, that’s all there is to it: you cut up apples, bananas and the like with katana and hope none hits the floor before you’ve had a chance to go postal on all that potassium.

There are four different modes, though all revolve around the same ‘cruelty to melons’ conceit. Arcade and Survival modes offer more intense bouts of blade-on-blueberry fury: both allow you to miss only three pieces of fruit1 before failing, while the latter also hurls edibles at you from robotic contraptions. Classic and Zen modes are much more relaxed, letting you slash (and miss) as much fruit as you like within 90 seconds. They also throw in modifiers, such as a freeze ability perfect for slaughtering limes in slow-mo.

Is it fun in small, vitamin C-rich doses? Absolutely. Is it essential at £ 13.99? Absolutely not. 2 My advice? Go punch some plums instead. Dave Meikleham

FOOTNOTES1 Slicing multiple pieces of fruit in one motion is the key to big combos. You can chase high scores on leaderboards, but other than that, there isn’t much to incentivise extended play.

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