Mountain Mind – Headbanger’s VR

Developer / Publisher – Sons of Earth Games
Price – US $9.99 / EU €9.99 / UK £6.99
Release Date – Mar 01, 2017
Input – Tracked Motion Controllers, Keyboard/Mouse
Play Area – Seated, Standing, Room-scale
Store – Steam
Reviewed on – Oculus Rift

Mountain Mind VR: A Weird Head Banging Experience might be one of the most aptly named VR experiences I have come across. The game is based around the idea of head banging alone, to some Stoner Rock and some slick visuals.

Pick your head and bang away!!!

As you bang your head with the music, a floating head in front of you follows your movements and  bangs along with you. There are currently 5 different songs each with their own landscape and avatar for headbanging. My personal favorite was the “Goddess of Time” landscape/song combination.

The strong point of the game is the hair and visual aesthetic that accompanies it. There is very little to do in the way of objectives or goals other than finishing a song and moving on to the next one. This is an VR experience, not a game. The experience itself is also very focused on their target audience, Stoner Rock fans who enjoy headbanging. If you fall into this target audience, then this experience is probably something that would appeal to you more than most.

The music is good, but not my personal favorite genre. Despite this soundtrack not being my personal music of choice, I still found it enjoyable. Headbanging along with the music was an amusing experience yet it lacked any depth or substance to keep me interested. If you don’t find yourself entranced in the music, there isn’t enough content to get more than 30 minutes or so out of the experience. If you are the type that could find yourself soaking up the Stoner Rock music, I could see how you may get more out of multiple listens.

Each head has it’s own art style and level and some look better than others

The game does not use any tracked motion controllers or any controllers at all, even though the store says differently. All selections are made via gazing at something for a while. Exiting a track/song is done by gazing up into the air for a few seconds, which returns you to the main menu. The design choice to not include any tracked motion controllers fits well with the experience as having to hold controllers while jamming along with the music would be a detriment.

What would I pay? Despite the interesting mechanics, the lack of purpose and limited, focused content makes the current asking price of $9.99 a bit of a hard sell. If you are a Stoner Rock fan who enjoys head banging, I could see this price being reasonable. If you are just interested in the visual/auditory experience alone I would be hard pressed to recommend it for anything above a $3.