KiteGr
Member
That game was hard to search and form an oppinion whether to buy it for 3 reasons.
The beggining is hard.
The game is expertly designed to draw attention to some points of interest and have low detail on areas with nothing important to find. Trying to stumble your self on later information before it's time will overwelm you. The ships log serves as a great check list and guilde to your next point of interest.
The second hurdle is the newtonian space physics. Any force requires a counterforce to stop, the astrlal bodies you try to land on keep moving and high jumps on low gravity could put you in real orbit or even worse, strand you into space. The Autopilot and the ability to mach your velocity to the astral bodies is a godsent, and you'll still need some trainning before landing somewhere whithout hicups. By the end you'll be traveling around like an expert astronaut.
Besides that, the game might seem light, but it's actually quite heavy as the solar system keeps rolling with or without you, and all colisions and graphics of you, your ship's and your probe's always stay loaded. Rarelly you'll run into a developer trick such as a loading door or an independent area to mask stuff working in the background. It was draining my Deck's battery in a couple of hours.
The story: (colored by spoiler level from insignificant to endgame)
lvl 1 You are an astronaut from a laid back race of alliens on your first day to explore your small solar system. The astronaut program is still in it's infancy with just a few other astronauts having landed on each of the other 3 planets and your moon. On your first day in the tuttorial area you learn the basic mechanics. How to act in zero G, how to repair your ship, how to use your probe, not how to fly (that tuttorial is very innacurate), how to see and avoid the phantom zones, how to use your translator, how the gravity crystals work, the existance of the Nomai (the advance civilisation that lived on your system before you) and the existance of the quantum obgects.
lvl 2 Leaving for your ship after completing the tuttorial area, a Nomai statue looks at you and stores your memories. As you make nothing of it and let your self loose on the solar system, 3 things become clear. The Universe is a scary place with a lot of ways to die. You are in a time-loop where you are being send back to the beginning of your game, keeping only your knowledge (that thankfully is stored on your ship's computer). Your system is about to go Supernova in 22 minutes. Your only salvation is to uncover the past and technology of the Nomai.
lvl 3 Each planet represents an existential dredd of mine. Brittle Hollow reprisents vertigo, with a literal black how beneath you eating away at your planet. The Ember twin represent the fear of getting crushed in an underground cave. The Ash twin represents your fear of getting sucked back on Ember twin. The Giant's deep represents the fear of storms and water. Dark Bramble represents "I don't Ever want to go to that place again" fear. The Quantum Moon represents existential fear.
lvl 4 The ending killed me! At first you thought that something was causing the sun to explode and could be avoided by researching enough, but then you see your fate is unavoidable, as the whole universe is naturally ending. You have to leave everything behind by breaking your loop sequrity and going to the Eye to face the universe's fate.
I didn't play the expansion content despite owning it, as it's well hidden in the game and all that information was already piling up on my brain to comprehent. I've also heard that it's even scaryer than the main game.
That game was an experience!
Once you go through it once, you'll only have your memory to remember it!
- It's progression is all based around real knowledge and how each clue would lead you to the next one. There are no upgrades or keys and barelly any switches, and the lack of knowledge is the only thing gatekeeping you from rushing to the end in 5 minutes from booting it. Any image could be an answer or a spoiler, so most revews end up just asking you to play it because "Trust me bro!".
- It's early hours are clunky. The game uses real newtonian physics, something we rarelly see in space videogames. This along with it being an indie game with poor graphics and no voice acting leaves a bad first impression.
- It came out close to "Outer Wolrds". A much higher profile game by a much more known developer, that was sure to catch most search result realestate. By mine and most's oppinion Outer Wilds was by far the better game.
The beggining is hard.
The game is expertly designed to draw attention to some points of interest and have low detail on areas with nothing important to find. Trying to stumble your self on later information before it's time will overwelm you. The ships log serves as a great check list and guilde to your next point of interest.
The second hurdle is the newtonian space physics. Any force requires a counterforce to stop, the astrlal bodies you try to land on keep moving and high jumps on low gravity could put you in real orbit or even worse, strand you into space. The Autopilot and the ability to mach your velocity to the astral bodies is a godsent, and you'll still need some trainning before landing somewhere whithout hicups. By the end you'll be traveling around like an expert astronaut.
Besides that, the game might seem light, but it's actually quite heavy as the solar system keeps rolling with or without you, and all colisions and graphics of you, your ship's and your probe's always stay loaded. Rarelly you'll run into a developer trick such as a loading door or an independent area to mask stuff working in the background. It was draining my Deck's battery in a couple of hours.
The story: (colored by spoiler level from insignificant to endgame)
lvl 1 You are an astronaut from a laid back race of alliens on your first day to explore your small solar system. The astronaut program is still in it's infancy with just a few other astronauts having landed on each of the other 3 planets and your moon. On your first day in the tuttorial area you learn the basic mechanics. How to act in zero G, how to repair your ship, how to use your probe, not how to fly (that tuttorial is very innacurate), how to see and avoid the phantom zones, how to use your translator, how the gravity crystals work, the existance of the Nomai (the advance civilisation that lived on your system before you) and the existance of the quantum obgects.
lvl 2 Leaving for your ship after completing the tuttorial area, a Nomai statue looks at you and stores your memories. As you make nothing of it and let your self loose on the solar system, 3 things become clear. The Universe is a scary place with a lot of ways to die. You are in a time-loop where you are being send back to the beginning of your game, keeping only your knowledge (that thankfully is stored on your ship's computer). Your system is about to go Supernova in 22 minutes. Your only salvation is to uncover the past and technology of the Nomai.
lvl 3 Each planet represents an existential dredd of mine. Brittle Hollow reprisents vertigo, with a literal black how beneath you eating away at your planet. The Ember twin represent the fear of getting crushed in an underground cave. The Ash twin represents your fear of getting sucked back on Ember twin. The Giant's deep represents the fear of storms and water. Dark Bramble represents "I don't Ever want to go to that place again" fear. The Quantum Moon represents existential fear.
lvl 4 The ending killed me! At first you thought that something was causing the sun to explode and could be avoided by researching enough, but then you see your fate is unavoidable, as the whole universe is naturally ending. You have to leave everything behind by breaking your loop sequrity and going to the Eye to face the universe's fate.
I didn't play the expansion content despite owning it, as it's well hidden in the game and all that information was already piling up on my brain to comprehent. I've also heard that it's even scaryer than the main game.
That game was an experience!
Once you go through it once, you'll only have your memory to remember it!
