Run. That’s the only instruction you’re given as you break open the door of the chamber you’ve just woken up in. There’s very little time for explanation from the woman who has contacted you, and there’s good reason as the spaceship Infinity falls apart around you. Alarms are going off, lasers cut off corridors, and security guards have a shoot on sight order for you. However that’s not the only danger that lurks in the dying ship, as you also learn a werewolf is hunting and you’re its prey.

Infinity Runner has various modes to it including a story mode, where you learn about the mythical beast intent on killing you. This mode is spread across 14 stages in seven ship locations from the engineering sector, Infinity’s docks, and even the exterior of the ship. Each stage has obstacles that you need to avoid by either sliding under them, jumping over them, or just changing the lane you’re running in. Occasionally you’re going to have to fight a guard, or three, through the use of quick time events.

On each stage you can choose the difficulty of the run, alternating between easy, normal and hard. This choice determines how many lives you have, how many obstacles will be in your path, and how fast you’re moving. It’s usually a good idea to try an area on normal first to get an idea of the route of the level, as this doesn’t change when choosing a difficulty. Failure is inevitable but as the environments become more familiar you can risk the harder challenges.

If you run out of lives in Infinity Runner you can forget about the checkpoints you’ve passed, due to the fact you will be sent back to the very beginning of the level. While the majority of deaths will be down to player fault, for example a slow reaction to jumping a laser, there are times when it feels like certain obstacles are a bit too close together. One instance of this is where you must dodge some debris before jumping through a broken monorail carriage door. You have a split second before the dodge and jump, and it took me quite a few goes to finally nail that timing. There are moments in the game though where the character powers up, making obstacles easier to beat.

Control wise there are a couple of configurations you can play with, choosing between buttons or controller movement. Switching between the two I found the button input to be much more accurate and responsive, compared to tilting my controller to look left  and right, as well as flicking it up or down to jump and slide. Instead you use the left analogue to change lane, right analogue to look and turn corners, while R2 and L2 take care of jump and slide. When trying to use the motion controls I found that a lot of the time the character would gravitate to a particular side of the screen, and lane changing wasn’t very accurate at all.

While the game is called Infinity Runner the story itself takes around two hours to complete, but that isn’t the end of the game. There is the arcade mode where you can choose to do an infinite run in any of the stages as long as you have unlocked them , as well as timed and distance based options. In timed runs you set how long the session will last and see how far you get, while distance is the opposite of that. They can be fun challenges since the routes change, and there is a competitive element involved thanks to the leaderboards.

Visually Infinity Runner looks good, though there are certain parts of the design which look quite last gen. They are mostly in the scenery but you only see them for a few seconds as you run past them. The sections on the ship exterior look fantastic, especially compared to the engineering sector which is incredibly bland to look at. Frame rates appear to hit the 60fps mark set by Wales Interactive, with the only slowdown appearing during the loading screens which would stutter quite a lot.

The music is a mixed bag within Infinity Runner with some tracks really adding to the atmosphere, while others clashed with the tone of a level. You can turn the music off and by doing this Infinity Runner feels much more immersive, as you can hear the feet hitting the floor with every step and doors hiss as they slide open. The voice acting is good, though there are moments where it sounds like the actress stumbled over a couple of sentences. The most annoying part of the games are the QTE fights which slow down the running, and feel like a hindrance. These can be switched off in the modes outside of the story though.

Infinity Runner is a really good addition to the runner genre, and at a price of £4.99 offers decent value for money due to the re-playability factor. You can try and beat your own scores to ascend the leaderboards, as well as tackle the game challenges such as completing the story without dying on hard. Infinity Runner is a good looking game with solid sound work, and it is fun to play. The motion controls aren’t the best and I wouldn’t recommend using them, while the stuttering on the loading screens also needs addressing. If you’re looking for a small game to play though, and like first person runners, then Infinity Runner could well be for you.

Score:7/10

Version tested: PS4