When I first heard that the builders of Five Nights at Freddy’s VR have been making a VR entry into the Hello Neighbor sequence, I used to be ecstatic. FNAF: Help Wanted is among the greatest Quest video games and is overwhelmingly a fan favourite with hundreds of stellar evaluations on the Quest and Steam shops.And the Hello Neighbor sequence could not be higher destined for VR, as this stealth sequence is performed completely from the primary individual and encourages environmental inspection and interplay.The sport has a number of efficiency hiccups on Quest 2 and the puzzles and traps might be a bit of extra open-ended however, for essentially the most half, Steel Wool Games completely delivered on the promise of Hello Neighbor in VR. It takes the sequence’ trademark mechanics and appears and melds them virtually completely in VR, and it is an absolute blast to play.Hello Neighbor: Search & Rescue is accessible on Quest, PSVR 2, and Steam VR for $29.99. Android Central was supplied a evaluation key for the Meta Quest model of the sport.Finding your pal(Image credit score: Steel Wool Games)The story in Hello Neighbor: Search and Rescue for the Quest and PSVR 2 revolves round a lacking boy. Five neighborhood mates band collectively in quest of their pal and, because it appears, the creepy neighbor, Mr. Peterson, is behind the disappearance.In the sport, you will swap between every child in real-time utilizing a walkie-talkie. Each child is in a distinct a part of the home and every one has their very own software for fixing puzzles scattered round the home. One child has a slingshot whereas one other has a bat, one other child has a magnifying glass, and the fourth has a flashlight.You’ll move one another keys, crowbars, hammers, PIN codes, and different issues to unlock doorways and safes as you discover Mr. Peterson’s home. You’ll knock down dilapidated partitions — there are an terrible lot of those — and discover mysterious clues as you remedy the riddles hidden inside the home.(Image credit score: Steel Wool Games)But, beware, as a result of Mr. Peterson is in the home, too. To get round him, you will not solely want endurance, however you will additionally want to make use of all method of diversions and traps to maintain him occupied whereas switching between youngsters to get into the creep’s basement.Despite the implications of the story, the sport itself is surprisingly family-friendly. Despite the implications of the story, the sport itself is surprisingly family-friendly. There’s no language or violence past some cartoony motion. While Mr. Peterson is extraordinarily ominous in VR — particularly because you play as shorter youngsters — he solely places every child again in a hiding closet once they get caught. It’s principally an especially elaborate sport of hide-and-seek.Image 1 of 3(Image credit score: Steel Wool Games)(Image credit score: Steel Wool Games)(Image credit score: Steel Wool Games)As you may think in a sport corresponding to this, there are many objects to work together with in the home. Anything from image frames to vases might be picked up and thrown to create a distraction, and the home is plagued by closets you can conceal in.If I had one grievance in regards to the design, it is that I’d have appreciated to see extra traps that might be arrange. The unique sport had bear traps you possibly can lay down within the occasion of a chase, however I did not discover any usable ones on this VR model. Instead, it appeared like I used to be primarily supposed to cover in a closet if I heard him coming.The VR model actually shines because of its distinctive character-switching mechanics and the spatial consciousness you can solely get in VR.And that is actually the place the VR model actually shines; having the ability to truly hear and perceive the place Peterson was at any given second. As you make your method by way of the home, you will hear him watching TV, having a shower, making meals within the kitchen, taking out the trash, or, in any other case, simply slinking round the home on the lookout for some pesky youngsters.The exploration is non-linear — which implies you possibly can stroll round the home at will as a substitute of shifting from level A to level B — so you possibly can remedy puzzles in any order your mind thinks is smart. It took me round 5 hours to finish the sport and discover among the secrets and techniques, and the developer says it’s going to probably take as much as 6 hours to search out the whole lot.Pushing the bounds(Image credit score: Steel Wool Games)Hello Neighbor: Search and Rescue is a really handsome sport on Quest, though it is clearly pushing the technical limits of the system. Hello Neighbor makes use of a Meta know-how known as Application Space Warp — or ASW — that lets builders create nicer-looking video games on the expense of some visible artifacts.In brief, ASW works by working the sport at 36 FPS after which utilizing AI to interpolate the frames so the sport runs at 72 FPS. While this usually works simply tremendous, there have been sufficient instances when the AI was clearly struggling to guess what I used to be going to do subsequent and that resulted in some wonky physics interactions.On Quest, the physics interactions are a bit of wonky and might generally be irritating.If you throw darts on the dart board within the treehouse, for instance, they’ll generally lodge themselves midway into the board and spaz out. Other instances, I’d discover my digital hand getting caught in a door, or different instances the place choosing up issues felt “slow.”Many of those weren’t a giant deal however I did discover the physics irritating when making an attempt to make use of the crowbar to pry boards off home windows and doorways. The physics simply weren’t proper and it was extra annoying to make use of than enjoyable.(Image credit score: Steel Wool Games)I might additionally see some individuals getting very uncomfortable once they inevitably get discovered by Mr. Peterson. Not solely is it mentally a bit disturbing to have some creep grabbing a toddler, however the digital camera motion that happens is a bit of jarring and oddly static feeling for a VR title.Switching between characters in real-time was enjoyable, and the puzzles all the time felt intelligent.With that stated, I actually loved the surroundings and the puzzles that have to be solved by switching between a number of characters. Even on Quest, switching between characters takes not more than a second or two the place the display fades to black after which instantly fades again in to vary views.The puzzles themselves have been very properly designed and all the time required using spatial consciousness — one thing VR video games do higher than conventional non-VR video games because of the flexibility to naturally transfer and go searching. Dropping keys by way of damaged floorboards or passing a crowbar to a different child between holes within the wall was satisfying and felt intelligent.Seeing a sequence as huge as Hello Neighbor make its method to VR has been nice and I totally loved the expertise. There are loads of secrets and techniques and collectibles to search out, so you’ll want to hold a watch out whereas exploring the home.

The Meta Quest 3 is likely to be only some months away, however the Quest 2 sells for lots lower than we’re anticipating that headset to debut at. Itching to take a look at the neighbor’s home in VR? This is your greatest wager.