Bullet hells have never been more vibrant than Super Glitter Rush

Gimme that sweet, sweet bullet-hell sugar.

Super Glitter Rush is perhaps the most appropriate name possible for a game like this, so kudos to the dev team for choosing to hit that nail square on the head. A sugar rush, a rush of adrenaline, the blood rushing to your head in a fit of rage. Whatever it is that you imagine when you read the title “Super Glitter Rush,” you’re probably right on the money.

Colorful, loud, and frequently infuriating, Super Glitter Rush is a sparkly bullet-hell nominated for this summer’s Indie Games Festival, hosted by Google Play. Although lacking any sort of narrative depth, Super Glitter Rush does its job of being action-packed from start to finish with a unique approach to the bullet-hell genre. As a result, the intense experience will likely wind up on our list of best Android games soon.

Where Glitter Rush truly shines for me is in its presentation. An overwhelming feast for the eyes and ears, Glitter Rush features exceptionally bold pixel art and an absolute killer chiptune soundtrack. Even just the menu music slaps! Character designs themselves are a mix of quirky and adorable, and there’s a good variety of playable characters you can unlock, who each have special abilities of their own.

Super Glitter Rush features exceptionally vibrant pixel art and a chiptune soundtrack that you’ll want to listen to all day long.

The basic gameplay is the same no matter how you slice it, though. Your character moves side to side at the bottom of the screen, controlled by only a virtual old-school joystick and one virtual button that both look like they were ripped right off an arcade cabinet. It couldn’t be simpler: you just slide your joystick back and forth to move and hit your one whole button to shoot your laser beam (or whatever it is).

Your foe is positioned at the top of the screen, Space Invaders style, and will reign absolute chaos down upon you. There aren’t really “levels” in Super Glitter Rush in the traditional sense. It’s more a boss rush game where you just blast your way through the game’s 30 bosses, who are all just as cute and quirky as your main characters.

Dodging is a big part of the equation in taking down these baddies, yes, but the larger strategy lies in that your character has limited life and a meter that must be built up to fire your attacks. If you fill your meter up all the way, you can also use a special attack that is totally bonkers. The trick is that your meter fills up by collecting gems that the bosses drop, represented by differently colored attacks interspersed among the others being fired at you.

Sweeping up the boss’s attacks with your own blasts increases attack power and creates space for you to survive waves of oncoming onslaught.

You also need to factor in that your attacks are made more powerful by picking up the foe’s own bullets as you blast upward. So if I’m about to get dunked on by a hail storm I know I can’t possibly dodge, I should fire off a well-timed attack that picks up a huge chunk of the boss’ bullets, accomplishing two things. One, it leaves an opening for me to not get destroyed, and two, it powers up your own attack. The whole goal of the fight is to time your attacks to pick up as many enemy bullets as you can with your own attacks, thereby gaining more control of the space and powering yourself up.

The only gripe I have against the game is that occasionally the virtual joystick does not go in the direction I am certain I swiped in. The way that you have to swipe back and forth is very finicky, and I’ve died more than once from a control misstep. Maybe this is just a case of blaming the controller, but I have similar issues even on the menu screen, so tightening that responsive up would be a nice touch.

Super Glitter Rush doesn’t pretend to be anything more than what it is: a fun, in-your-face bullet-hell arcade game. I can appreciate that. It’s also a great value since it’s actually free! A pretty excellent free Android game, at that. You can, however, pay to remove ads and support the developer, which I’m always prone to do (especially when it comes to indies). Free to try and very easy to get into, Super Glitter Rush is worth a shot!

Super Glitter Rush

Free w/ ads at Google Play Store

A crazy cute and colorful bullet-hell, Super Glitter Rush is just as brutal as it is adorable. Blast and dodge your way through 30 retro levels with a variety of cute characters and an infectious soundtrack.