When comparing Cosmic Trip vs Fantastic Contraption, the Slant community recommends Fantastic Contraption for most people. In the question“What are the best HTC Vive games?” Fantastic Contraption is ranked 22nd while Cosmic Trip is ranked 33rd. The most important reason people chose Fantastic Contraption is:
Thanks to the Vive, building a contraption is incredibly fun and actually feels like you're creating something "real". You can move around your machine to adjust it and add new components in a very natural way.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro High level of polish
The look of the game as well as the gameplay has a great level of polish reminiscent of a AAA release. While this is in early access and not finished as well as made by a small indie team, the level of detail to the game and its gameplay far exceeds most release offerings for the Vive.
Pro Immersive base defense gameplay
The implementation of virtual reality in a base defense game is done quite well. It is all in first person, where you mine different nodes on an alien planet in order to build machines and structures, which will then allow you to automate the process (much like an RTS). From there you can attack enemies on your own with an equipped frisbee, all while you send out troops to attack incoming forces as well. What makes this work so well is the design of the game, being that you actually take part in all of these tasks, it makes the user feel more connected to what is happening.
Pro Great use of haptic feedback
The haptics used in the game allow for pretty accurate sensations when manipulating objects in VR. Being a new technology, many games are having issue with the accuracy and "feel" of their haptics, luckily the team developing Cosmic Trip have nailed down how to create a game that feels right, out of the box.
Pro Very fun to build and create machines
Thanks to the Vive, building a contraption is incredibly fun and actually feels like you're creating something "real". You can move around your machine to adjust it and add new components in a very natural way.
Pro Encourages creativity
By giving you a task and leaving how you will complete it up to your own devices the game allows for a sense of creativity as well as the feeling of accomplishment.
Pro Cute art style
The art style is cute and when you look at how you look only to see you're a cute animal, it can be quite funny and sweet. You also have a pet cat named Neko that you get your supplies from, and a dog that you press to go to the next level.
Pro Comes free with the vive bundle
Comes free with the Vive bundle, which is a bundle with no additional cost, but has limited stock, so may be difficult to obtain.
Cons
Con No completion point (lack of content)
You either die at the hands of AI attackers on your base, or you succeed long enough that the hardware being used cannot keep up with the amount of bots created in the game, causing too much lag. There is no end to the gameplay, it will continue to the point you lose or the game just lags out. Mainly this is all due to the fact that this is an early access game that is unfinished. There are not many options to change up the gameplay, making for something lacking in content, which may get tiring after repeated plays.
Con Currently too easy
The gameplay itself does not offer as much challenge as it should, while this may change in the future, since it is still in development, currently it may be too easy for many players.
Con Expensive
It's the most expensive game on the Vive costing $39.99. When comparing price to content, there may be better options out there at a lower price.
Con Building can be frustrating and causes a lot of trial and error
It is almost impossible to attach objects completely straight to one another, meaning if you are trying to use multiple wheels, each will be a bit crooked, causing a lot of adjusting and restarting, which can be very frustrating.