Bezier, despite the French title, lifted from the Renault employee Pierre Bézier, who in the 1960s helped teach computers how to draw curves, is a quintessentially British sort of video game. It fits snugly within the tradition of eccentric psychedelic shooters - Jeff Minter's Space Giraffe, Rob Fearon's Death Ray Manta, Bizarre Creations' Geometry Wars - and combines the unusual bedfellows of austere science fiction storytelling with twin stick shooting. Eight years in the making, the game, intended to be the first in a series of nine projects by its creator, Philip Bak, is a glorious carnival of neon particle effects, subtle tips of the hat to arcade classics and enthralling, if riotous, game design.
Comparisons to Geometry Wars are natural: both games take place over a light-pricked star-scape; both games feature a glowing cast of geometric shapes that are out to kill you with single-minded dedication. As in Geometry Wars, these skittish killers swarm in your wake as you sweep the square play area, then scatter as soon as you pivot your guns their way. And both games are best played with a loose grip, in a Zen-like state where the visual noise and frippery peels away, allowing you to dodge and plot with clarity.
While Geometry Wars found beauty and complexity through a narrow set of mathematical rules, Bezier comes with a thatch of systems. There's a lot to juggle in the three or so minutes you have to complete each of the game's 15-odd stages, but, once properly understood, the magnificence in the blend becomes immediately obvious. Your ship's health (known, cutely, as 'Ouch') depletes each time you're struck by a bullet or a rival hull. This can be replenished by collecting the tiny green fragments dropped by downed foes, or by shooting down one of the few health restoring asteroids scattered about each stage. Blue fragments, by contrast, increase your gun's power (and score multiplier) up to ten times its basic kick. This multiplier is constantly depleting, so, in order to maximise your chances as both survival and high score, you must keep sucking up a steady stream of fragments.
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