Gaming: Beat Hazard Song Selection

This one is going to be short and, hopefully, sweet. I've been off-and-on sick the past couple days, so my apologies on not doing something more substantial...

Anyways. Here we go.

Beat Hazard Ultra

For those of you who don't remember, I reviewed the games in a Humble Bundle last week. One of those games was Beat Hazard Ultra, which essentially does to arcade shooters what Audiosurf did to racing games.


And if you don't know what Audiosurf is, you should get it. And play it. That's probably more important.

(In related news, I am aware that the Humble Bundle review is the post right below this one. On the other hand, people who go straight to the post won't know that, so I'm totally not letting on.)

Song Selection

Now that you've played Audiosurf and have Beat Hazard - or not, because you're reading this just because and/or are a giant sieve - it should be pretty obvious that selecting the right sorts of songs is very important for enjoying the game.

First and foremost, I do not advise picking very slow, very quiet songs. It not only clashes with the aesthetic of the game, the power of your weapons and the speed of enemies is largely determined by the volume, tempo, and other characteristics of the song.

In short, if you pick a slow game it very quickly turns into a game of 'dodge the screen full of enemies that you can't kill quick enough, who also don't move much at all.'

Sounds like fun, I guess...?

Rule one, then, is to pick a song that is generally pretty fast and at least of moderate volume.


Rule two is that songs get more difficult the more varied they are.

A great instance of this is any metal song with a ton of heavy guitar riffs followed by a short, terminal drop-off in volume. This will greatly vary the power of your weapons and the speed at which ships are moving, often unexpectedly.

Basically, add the bit from before where the screen fills up with the fact that the enemies intermittently speed up again and, often, will kill you before you can clear the screen again.

I'm not absolutely positive on how the game determines when to throw a boss at you, but I've been paying attention occasionally and this rule also seems to govern how often one ends up with a boss. It's far from 100%, but I have yet to talk to anyone with a better hypothesis.

Rule three is to pick tracks that aren't too long or too short. Generally somewhere between three and eight minutes is correct. Less than three and it doesn't feel satisfying to survive, while tracks longer than eight minutes are punishing and you may never manage to beat them on the hardest difficulty.

Rule four is to pick music you like and know well. This will help your mood in addition to boosting your score because of how familiar you are with the ebb and flow of the song.

If you want a real challenge, on the other hand, have a friend give you a bunch of acoustic metal tracks you've never listened to before.

You will die. It will be unpleasant. You will, in most cases, refuse to do it again.

And there we have it. Four really simple rules that should help you enjoy an excellent game a little bit more. Hope you enjoyed the read, apologies again for the shortness, comments below, follow on the right, and I hope you all have a great day.